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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Canadian Bankclerk, by J. P. Buschlen
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: A Canadian Bankclerk
+
+Author: J. P. Buschlen
+
+Release Date: March 11, 2010 [EBook #31602]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A CANADIAN BANKCLERK ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Al Haines
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Frontispiece: "The Conscientious Clerk"  _From drawing by Paul N.
+Craig, Omaha, Neb., 1913_]
+
+
+
+
+A CANADIAN
+
+BANKCLERK
+
+
+BY
+
+J. P. BUSCHLEN
+
+
+
+
+TORONTO:
+
+WILLIAM BRIGGS
+
+1913
+
+
+
+
+Copyright, Canada, 1913, by
+
+J. P. BUSCHLEN
+
+
+
+
+Dedicated
+
+TO THE
+
+Conscientious Clerk
+
+
+
+
+_DUST._
+
+  _My box is full of others' cash,
+    My pocket full of air,
+  My head is crammed with cleric trash,
+    Layer upon layer._
+
+  _I gaze upon the business mob
+    That throngs before my cage,
+  And watch their human pulses throb
+    In greed, fear, rage._
+
+  _Yet through the vapor and the must
+    I often catch a smile--
+  As though someone had lost the lust,
+    And, for a while,_
+
+  _Regarded me, the shoveller,
+    As greater than the gold,
+  Which, after all, belongs to her--
+    Old Mother Mould._
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+The story herein told is true to life; true, the greater part of it, to
+my own life.  Also, I am convinced that my experience in a Canadian
+Bank was but mildly exciting as compared with that of many others.
+
+My object in publishing "Evan Nelson's" history is to enlighten the
+public concerning life behind the wicket and thus pave the way for the
+legitimate organization of bankclerks into a fraternal association, for
+their financial and social (including moral) betterment.
+
+Bank officials, I trust, will see to it that my misrepresentations are
+exposed.
+
+To mothers of bankclerks who attach overmuch importance to the
+gentility of their Boy's avocation; to fathers who think that because
+the bank is rich its employes must necessarily become so in time; to
+friends who criticize the bankclerks of their acquaintance for not
+settling down--this story is addressed.
+
+To the men of our banks who are dissatisfied with the business they
+have chosen, or someone else has chosen for them; to Old Country clerks
+who come out to Canada under the impression that Five Dollars is as
+good as One Pound; to bank employes in the United States, and to office
+men everywhere--I am telling my tale.
+
+Finally, I appeal to "the girls we have known."  Be sure you study the
+subject thoroughly before accusing that inscrutable, proud and
+procrastinating clerk of yours of inconstancy.
+
+THE AUTHOR.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAPTER.
+
+         PREFACE
+     I.  OUR BANKER
+    II.  SWIPE DAYS
+   III.  A MAN OF THE WORLD
+    IV.  BEING A SPORT
+     V.  MOVED
+    VI.  THE VILLAGE MAIDEN
+   VII.  A BANK HOLIDAY
+  VIII.  A SPORT GONE TO SEED
+    IX.  THE SEED MULTIPLIES
+     X.  TROUBLE COMES
+    XI.  JOYS OF BANKING
+   XII.  SOME WHEEL-COGS COME TOGETHER
+  XIII.  THE MACHINERY GRINDS
+   XIV.  POKER AND PREACHING
+    XV.  FIRED
+   XVI.  BLACKBALLED
+  XVII.  A BANKER'S GIRL
+ XVIII.  IN THE COUNTRY OF OUR COUSINS
+   XIX.  FAR-AWAY GREEN FIELDS
+    XX.  HIGH FINANCE AND PROMOTING
+   XXI.  THE ASSOCIATED BANKCLERKS OF CANADA
+  XXII.  SHE WAITS FOR US
+
+
+
+
+A CANADIAN BANKCLERK
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+_OUR BANKER._
+
+The Ontario village of Hometon rested.  It had been doing for so many
+years.  There, in days gone by, pioneers with bushy beards--now long
+out-of-date, but threatening to sprout again--had fearlessly faced the
+wolf-haunted forests, relying, no doubt, upon the ferocity of their own
+appearance to frighten off the devourer.
+
+A few old elm trees still remained in the village, to protect it from
+the summer sun; and still lived also an occasional pioneer, gnarled and
+rugged like the old elms, to sigh and shake his head at the new
+civilization, and shelter whom he might from the power of its stroke.
+
+One of these ancient fathers meandered across the main street and into
+a grocery store.  He plucked a semi-petrified prune from its sticky
+environment and drew a stool up to the counter.
+
+"Well, Dad," greeted the grocer, "what's new in the old town?"
+
+The old gentleman worried the stolen morsel into one cheek and replied:
+
+"Our boys keep a-leavin' on us, John; keep a-goin'."
+
+While the grocer stood wondering whether the "keep a-goin'" referred to
+himself or "our boys," a customer entered.
+
+"How d'you do, Mrs. Arling," he smiled, leaving the old man to his
+quid-like mouthful.
+
+But, in the case of a lady shopper, where business interferes with the
+telling of a story--or anything--postpone business.
+
+"Ah yes, Grandpa Newman," she sighed, "the town will soon be deserted."
+
+The grey-haired man looked at her as much as to ask: "Pray, how did you
+manage to overhear what I was saying?"  What he did ask was:
+
+"How does his mother feel, Mrs. Arling?"
+
+"I'm just on my way there now," replied the lady-shopper; "give me a
+can of pork-and-beans, will you, John?"
+
+The grocer, whom almost everyone in town called by his first name,
+climbed nimbly up the side of his store and fished out the desired
+article.  Meanwhile Mrs. Arling winked at the old man and whispered:
+
+"He looks like a boy, Grandpa, the way he scales that shelf; but he's
+past forty!"
+
+"Aye, so he is, Mary; but you both seem like chits to me."
+
+Grandpa Newman smiled when "Mary" had gone, then shook his head and
+sighed.  The grocer proceeded to wheedle more news out of the village
+information bureau.
+
+"Who's leaving us now, Dad?" he asked.
+
+"Young Nelson; he's goin' away out here to Mt. Alban to j'in one of
+them banks."
+
+"You don't say!"
+
+"Yes," drawled the grandsire, "it beats the Old Scratch how these
+youngsters have got new-fangled idears into their heads.  Now, when I
+was a boy--"
+
+But the observation Mrs. Arling was, a few minutes later, making to
+Mrs. Nelson, is more to the point:
+
+"My dear Caroline, I just dropped in to tell you how sorry and how glad
+I am."
+
+Mrs. Arling was fair, round and vivacious.  The woman to whom she
+talked was dark and slender, but also vivacious.  The latter smiled.
+
+"It is lonesome, Mary; but you know we can't keep them home forever."
+
+"No, indeed," agreed Mrs. Arling, "that's what I tell my silly old man
+when he gets to worrying about our boy, who's only twelve.  Let them
+go--they'll be glad to come back."
+
+"It's all very well for you to sit there and act brave," laughed Mrs.
+Nelson, "but wait till the day arrives."
+
+The force of the argument told on Mrs. Arling.
+
+"Maybe you're right, Caroline," she admitted.  "But it must be a great
+consolation to see Evan enter such a splendid business."
+
+"That is what consoles me, Mary.  Banking is such a respectable,
+genteel occupation!"
+
+The dark woman's eyes were bright; she spoke with great pride.
+
+"You're right, Caroline, it is genteel.  Bank boys get into such nice
+society.  And they can always--you know--look so nice!"
+
+"You know, Mary," rejoined the slender woman, "his pa almost repented
+giving him permission to quit school.  Evan was getting along so well.
+He would have taken both his matric. and his second this summer; but he
+_would_ go in a bank, and when a vacancy occurred so near home we
+thought perhaps it would be as well to let him go, in case he should
+not get so good a chance again."
+
+Mrs. Arling sat in thought.
+
+"Caroline," she said at length, "do you think Evan ever cared much
+about our girl?"
+
+Mrs. Nelson blushed before one who had been a school-chum.
+
+"I was going to mention that," she said, bashfully.
+
+"You think there is something between them, then?"
+
+"Why, Mary, they are only children.  And yet, I often wish that Evan
+would some day get serious."
+
+"Wouldn't it be lovely!"
+
+The conversation drifted, like ocean-tide, into many fissures and along
+innumerable channels.  The May afternoon ebbed away.
+
+"I really must be going," said Mrs. Arling, suddenly.  "Let us know how
+he gets along.  I'm sure the whole town misses Evan, and is proud of
+him."
+
+Mrs. Nelson smiled fondly.
+
+"And we, too, are proud of Our Banker."
+
+
+It was the second day of "our banker's" apprenticeship.  According to
+the chronology of homesickness he had been in the banking business
+about a year.  He stood at a high desk in the back end of a dark
+office, gazing blankly on a heap of letters addressed, or to be
+addressed, everywhere.  An open copying-book lay at his elbow, the
+pages of which were smeared with indelible streaks.  Clerical experts
+had invented that book for the purpose of recording letters, but Nelson
+had applied too much water, and the result of his labors was chaos;
+worse--oblivion.
+
+"Just gaze on that!" cried the teller-accountant, Alfred Castle.
+
+While Alfred gazed a pencil artist might have made a good sketch of
+him--if the artist, of course, had been any good.  The sketch, to be
+perfect, would need to portray a tall, slim, blonde person with
+feminine features.  But no crayon could convey an idea of the squeaky
+voice and the supercilious manner.
+
+"I can't understand how anyone could ball things up like that," he
+continued.
+
+But assertions seemed incapable of rousing Evan from his stupid
+lethargy.  A question might help.
+
+"Why didn't you stop before you had spoiled the whole bunch?" asked the
+teller sharply.
+
+Evan swallowed.
+
+"I kept thinking," he stammered, "that each one--"
+
+Castle turned away impatiently, refusing to hear the speaker out.  He
+entered his cage and closed the door, leaving Evan to his nightmare.
+The manager strolled back through the office.
+
+"Where's Perry?" he asked the new junior.
+
+"Out with the drafts, sir," replied Evan, weakly.
+
+The manager was worthy of description also.  He was short, heavy of
+shoulders and slightly knock-kneed.  He was perhaps forty years old,
+his hair was getting thin, and his dark eyes snapped behind a pair of
+glasses.  Just now, instead of snapping, his eyes twinkled.
+
+"What in thunder have you been trying to do?" he exclaimed.
+
+As he leafed over the pages of the copying-book his mirth came nearer
+and nearer the surface, until at last he was laughing aloud and with
+much enjoyment.
+
+"Cheer up," he said, seeing the expression of Evan's face, "we'll let
+them go this time without re-writing."
+
+Then he showed the young clerk how to copy a letter without spoiling
+both the letter and the tissue-paper pages.
+
+"Thank you, Mr. Robb," said Evan, earnestly.
+
+While the dainty teller fretted in his cage, like a rare species of
+wild animal, the manager dug Nelson out of his mess and tried to make
+light of the disaster.
+
+"We all have to learn," he said kindly.
+
+Sam Robb might have been either a diplomat or merely a good-hearted
+human being.  At any rate, Evan Nelson resolved, after the tone of
+Robb's words had penetrated, that he would always do his utmost to
+please the manager.
+
+The return of Porter Perry, alias the "Bonehead," was heralded by loud
+scuffling over by the ledgers.  A string of oaths escaped ("escaped" is
+hardly the way to express it) the ledger-keeper, William Watson, as
+Porter approached.
+
+"You ----! why didn't you get back here sooner?"
+
+The teller raised his blonde head.
+
+"Enough of that profanity, Watson," he said, peremptorily.
+
+Perry, also called "the porter," dodged Watson, and, muttering a savage
+growl, shot across the office to the collection desk.
+
+"Here, you," said Mr. Robb, "get busy on this mail.  Where have you
+been--playing checkers in the library or shooting craps on the
+sidewalk?"
+
+Porter still had his hat on.  He took the hint when the manager said,
+half-mischievously, "Judging by the size of the mail, don't you think
+you had better stay a while?"
+
+The remainder of the day's work meant confusion and headaches for Evan.
+Before going to his boarding-house for supper he took a walk by himself
+along one of the back streets of Mt. Alban.  A song his sister used to
+sing seemed to dwell in the very air about him.  It associated itself
+with home memories and sent a thrill through him.
+
+Mt. Alban was only thirty miles from Hometon, and yet Evan felt that he
+was gone from home forever.  So he was--if he continued to work in the
+bank.  He knew that he would be able to get home only for an occasional
+week-end; nor were the Hometon trains convenient to bank hours.  There
+was no branch of the bank in Hometon, and he would, consequently, never
+be located there.  When the first move came it would take him still
+further away.
+
+Evan sauntered, with his thoughts, past comfortable homes fronted with
+lawns and shaded by weeping willows.  There is a peculiar melancholia
+about a May day; it had an effect on the young bankclerk.  He walked by
+hedges beyond the end of Mt. Alban's asphalt out into the suburbs.
+Spring birds sang their thanks to Nature, and to the homesick heart a
+bird's singing is sadness.  It is natural for such a heart to seek
+quiet.  Evan had no desire for company.  He wanted to think, all by
+himself.  His mind travelled in the one circle, the arcs of which were
+home, school and the bank.  Yes, and Frankie Arling!
+
+Although only seventeen he had a tenacious way of liking a girl; and
+Frankie had always appealed to him.  He thought of her as he walked by
+the hedges.  It was she, indeed, who helped him, more than anything
+else, to forget the ordeal of his first few days' clerkship.  He
+shuddered when he thought of the hundred and one inscrutable books in
+the office, so well known to the teller and Watson, and a shiver
+accompanied thought of mail and copying-books; but he viewed matters
+from a different angle when Frankie came forward in his mind.  How
+worldly-wise he would be when he went home, and what a hit he would
+make with his own money in the ice-cream places of Hometon!  Wouldn't
+Frankie be proud of him!
+
+Exclamation marks hardly do justice to Evan's enthusiasm as he allowed
+himself to speculate on the future.  Being "good stuff" at bottom, he
+forced himself, finally, on this May-day walk, to look at the sunlight
+on the lawns and trees; and when he doubled back to the boarding-house
+it was with a good imitation of his old football energy.  At table he
+spoke blithely to the guests, and was quite gay during soup.  Cold
+roast beef brought a slight chill with it.  Cake had something of a
+sour flavor.  He drank his tea in silence.
+
+In the evening he declined an invitation to a party, extended to him
+over the telephone, at the bank.  After sweeping out the office he
+perched himself on a stool and wrote a long letter home.  Before
+daylight had quite disappeared he "wound" the vault combination,
+seriously, faithfully, and crept up the back stairs to his bed above
+the bank's treasure.  He soberly inspected a heavy revolver, placed it
+on a chair beside the bed, and retired with a sound not unlike a groan.
+
+Perry came in late and raised a dreadful hubbub.  He smoked cigarettes
+in the room, whistled the raggiest rags and tried his best to make
+things uncomfortable for the new man.  Nelson ground his teeth beneath
+the sheets and wished he had been born strong.
+
+The first official question Evan was asked the following morning
+concerned the winding of the combination.
+
+"Never forget that," enjoined Watson.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," called the teller from his cage, "come here."  Evan
+obeyed the summons.
+
+"Go over to the B---- Bank and ask them for their general ledger."
+
+"All right, sir," said Nelson, meekly, and taking his cap from a peg
+went out to execute the commission.
+
+He had hardly disappeared when Watson walked to the phone and called up
+the B---- Bank, informing them of Nelson's mission and asking them to
+send him on to some other bank.  It was half an hour before the junior
+returned; he had been all over town; the report he brought with him was
+this:
+
+"I found out it had just been sent back here."
+
+Now the general ledger of a bank contains a summary of all business
+done.  It would not do for one bank to see the general ledger of
+another.  Neither the branches nor the clerks of one bank may have
+business secrets in common with another bank; of course it is all right
+for head offices and general managers to get their heads together in
+such small matters as keeping down the rate of interest and curtailing
+loans--but then all competitors should unite against that great enemy,
+the public.
+
+Evan was given a copy of "Rules and Regulations" to study while waiting
+for the "Bonehead" to get his drafts ready for delivery.  He was
+pointed to the clause on secrecy and commanded to memorize it forthwith.
+
+The new junior soon discovered that Porter Perry was something of a
+joke among Mt. Alban merchants.  The "Bonehead" had sometime and
+somewhere earned the dignity of his title.  The way he approached
+customers about a draft was ridiculous even to Evan--and it meant
+something for Evan to have a definite idea about anything these
+apprenticeship days.  Remarks passed between store clerks, and the
+giggles and smirks of girls behind counters, did not relieve the
+embarrassment Nelson felt at being sub-associated with Perry, and worse
+still, the compulsory recipient of loudly bawled pointers.  In
+proportion as Nelson felt humiliated did Perry feel dignified and
+important.
+
+The Bonehead had a wonderful faculty for calling people by their first
+names on the street.  This, he doubtless argued, would impress the new
+"swipe" with a sense of his (Porter's) popularity.  It does not take
+long for boys in a bank to conceive a high and mighty regard for
+position.
+
+Back to the office from their morning round, Perry took it upon himself
+to teach Evan the mysteries of the Collection Register.  After half an
+hour's faithful instruction the teller came along and inspected the
+work.  Two dozen drafts had been entered wrong; "Drawer" was mixed up
+with "Endorser," dates of issue were confused with dates of maturity,
+and everything but the amounts was topsy-turvy.
+
+"You are, without a doubt," said Castle, turning away, as was his
+habit, without trying to pull the boys through their trouble, "the
+worst mess I ever came across."  His remarks were addressed to Perry,
+particularly.
+
+Evan went flat.  It is thrillingly unpleasant to find yourself an
+incompetent in the routine of an office when you could with ease recite
+Hugo's verses in French and write a long treatise on the Punic Wars.
+Evan inwardly shuddered.  Perry stood beside him grinning and muttering
+imprecations on the teller.
+
+"What difference does it make how you enter them?" he said, and
+grabbing a handful of drafts, stamped them at random with the bank's
+endorsement stamp and the "C" stamp.
+
+Evan stood looking out of the back window.  A robin, digging for food
+on a grassy plot, raised his bright little eyes to the bankclerk, as
+much as to say:
+
+"Come on out, old chap.  You'll never find anything to eat in that
+dark, musty place!"
+
+As he gazed on the gay bird Evan remembered lessons from his childhood
+reader.  His mind persisted in flying back to school-days.  Why?  Did
+he still crave knowledge?  Was he hungry for something he knew the bank
+would never give him?
+
+Years later Evan knew why his mind had dwelt upon the dear days of
+school life.  At school he had had scope for his imagination and his
+genius, in the writings of poet and historian, inventor and novelist.
+He could drink as deeply as he would of the fountain of learning, and
+still the springs would be there for him, soothing, refreshing.
+
+Not so in the bank.  Although he knew little or nothing of the business
+as yet, something told him that here was a shorn pasture.  He could
+find plenty of work for his hands, and bewildering, tiring work for his
+head; but where was there occupation and recreation for the mind?
+
+Perhaps the fact that he was associated with a boy of Perry's calibre
+made the contrast between school and office wider.  He recalled
+examination-days when he had sat before a long paper with a feeling of
+power and security.  His pen could not travel fast enough, so familiar
+was he with French and Latin vocabulary and construction, Ancient
+History, Modern Literature, English Grammar, and other subjects.  But
+here in the bank he stumbled over a sight draft for $4.17 drawn by a
+grocery firm and accepted by one Jerry Tangle.
+
+Of course Evan exaggerated matters.  Everyone who is homesick paints
+home in beautiful colors and daubs every other place with mud-grey.  He
+forgot lamplight hours when he had wrested groans from Virgil and
+provoked the shade of Euclid, and remembered only the good old friends
+and the favorite studies of school-days.  He did not know that Time
+would bring familiarity with bank routine and that he would learn to
+like the brainless labors of a clerk.  He only knew that he felt
+hungry, empty; that he had given up something illimitable for a
+mathematical thing hedged about with paltry figures.
+
+Evan was roused from his reverie by the feminine voice of Castle.
+
+"Here you, get me ten three-dollar bills."
+
+The teller handed him six fives.  Evan was, for a moment, doubtful of
+the existence of the denomination asked for, but he reasoned that
+Castle would not give him the thirty dollars and look so serious if it
+were only a joke.  He went around among the banks on a wild-goose-chase
+for the second time that day.  A sympathizing junior from another bank
+met him on the street.
+
+"Say, Bo," he said, grinning; "don't let 'em kid you any more."
+
+Evan's eyes suddenly opened.  He made a confidant of this fellow and
+asked him about the initiation tricks of bankclerks.  He was warned
+against winding combinations, ringing up fictitious numbers on the
+telephone, and other misleaders.
+
+Evan did not smile when he handed the six fives back to the teller.  He
+said nothing in reply to Castle's question, until the teller grew
+intolerable; then he growled:
+
+"Go to hell!"
+
+Evan was not a profane individual, as a rule, but there were times when
+drastic measures seemed justifiable.
+
+Castle looked at him with real anger, and came out of his cage.
+
+"You darn young pup!" he exclaimed menacingly.
+
+Watson raised his voice in a loud laugh, and drew the teller's
+attention to the new man.  Mr. Robb came back to the cage for some
+change,--and the storm did not mature.
+
+Evan was not relieved.  He wanted to have a row with Castle.  But it
+was not the teller he worried about back at his own desk: it was
+himself.  He was ignorant!  With all his high-school education and his
+big marks in languages he did not know that combinations should not be
+wound, or that three-dollar bills were not somewhere in circulation.
+There _was_ knowledge for him in the bank, after all!
+
+And he decided to make that knowledge his.  He applied himself to the
+office books, after that, and fought against the desire to quit and go
+back to school.  He would ask questions about everything and know all
+there was to know.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+_SWIPE DAYS._
+
+When Nelson was able to take out the collections Porter found himself
+in line for the savings ledger.  It never occurred to the Bonehead that
+elevation was apt to bring added responsibilities; he thought only of
+the promotion.  Nothing now mattered except the fact that J. Porter
+Perry was a ledger keeper.  He managed to drop the information in every
+store on his last trip round with the bills, and proclaimed his
+successor in a tone that was very irritating to the new "swipe."
+
+Evan ground his teeth--but thought of Frankie.  He spoke respectfully
+to all the bank's customers, and tried to act like a gentleman, on the
+street.  In a week's time he knew every merchant in town well enough to
+speak to him, and had overcome the giggles and whisperings of counter
+girls.
+
+Mornings were always bright enough to him.  When he first wakened a
+kind of pall usually settled about his lonesome crib, but the May
+sunlight soon helped him forget that he was "out in the world alone."
+He knew that his father would gladly send him money and stand by him no
+matter what happened.  This was great consolation, although Evan did
+not admit to himself that it was.  He wanted to be an independent man,
+as his forefathers had been; he was unwilling to have his father
+support him any longer by store-labor.  When he reflected that soon he
+would be able to keep himself and make little gifts to his mother and
+sister he took courage and forged through whatever difficulty happened
+to be in the way.
+
+Evan had seen college boys fritter away their time, miss examinations
+repeatedly and get into trouble that cost their fathers dearly.  He
+determined that he would keep clear of youthful mixups and try to save
+his money, to show his parents that he appreciated what they had done
+for him, and to repay them, as well as he could, for what they had
+given him.  Sometimes he thought he had made a mistake in going into a
+bank, but he felt, at that, that it was a brave and unselfish thing to
+do, and he thought he saw wherein banking had many advantages over
+school life.  He could get an education behind the wicket and the iron
+railing that would make him self-reliant.  This idea fixed itself
+firmly in his mind.
+
+Homesickness still bothered him, of course.  It made itself most
+strongly felt after meals, like a species of gout.  A youth, especially
+a bankclerk, usually enjoys a good appetite; there is considerable
+excitement about satisfying it.  But when bodily hunger is appeased the
+mind has leisure to satisfy itself or to feel dissatisfied.  Evan could
+not throw off the gloom that settled on him in the afternoons and
+evenings.  He saw and heard constantly that which reminded him of home
+and those he loved best.  But he did not succumb to the torture.  He
+faced his trials and resolved to make good.
+
+While Nelson was battling against foes seen and unseen, Perry was
+engaged in gladiatorial combat with a savings ledger.  In the space of
+a week he had developed a singularly profane vocabulary.  Probably the
+contiguity of Watson had something to do with it.  He was under the
+special tutelage of Watson, and the handling he received was anything
+but gentle.  It surely did require patience to instill anything into
+that head of Porter's.  His instructor would stand over him and tell
+him in a dozen words just exactly what entries to make in a customer's
+passbook.  Porter would stare into oblivion during the lesson and when
+it was done make a dab at his ink-pot, enter up a cheque as credit,
+cross it out and make it a debit, then reverse the entry--all before
+Watson could interfere.  The Bonehead was not slow; in fact, he was too
+rapid--but his swiftness was a serious detriment since the direction
+taken was usually wrong.  Porter acted on impulses, and they seemed
+destined forever to be senseless.  A swift inspiration came to him, he
+made a slash with his heavily inked pen, there was a blot, a figure
+with heavy lines drawn crookedly through it, an exclamation of
+despair--and then the blank look.  The vacant expression seemed to be
+behind all his woes, and an empty mind was undoubtedly behind that.
+
+"You missed your calling, Port," said Bill Watson on one occasion; "you
+should have been a sign painter.  Those aren't figures you are making,
+you know."
+
+Perry looked hopelessly at his work and then into the ledger keeper's
+face.  Watson indulged in a spasm of mirth.
+
+"I can hardly wait till balance day," he stammered, with difficulty
+controlling himself; "that nut of yours will crack--and I don't think
+there'll be enough kernel to excite a squirrel."
+
+"Aw, cut it out and show me this," grumbled the savings-man.
+
+"Yes," interrupted the teller, in his mandatory way, "don't be kidding
+him all the time, Watson."
+
+The ledger keeper looked at Castle through the wire of the cage.
+
+"Oh, hello, Clarice," he said, "when did you get back?"
+
+The teller reddened, but made no reply.  He was not accustomed to
+impudence, for he was a near relative of Inspector Castle's.  This
+time, though, he could not find words to support his dignity, so he
+remained silent.
+
+Evan heard him speaking to the manager about it, later.
+
+"I simply won't stand it, Mr. Robb," he was saying; "they've got to
+show respect."
+
+"Well, you know, Alf," said the manager carelessly, "they're only boys.
+Don't be too hard on them....  By the way, how do you like Nelson?"
+
+"Oh, he's no worse than the general run," replied Castle impatiently;
+"I suppose he'll get there in time."
+
+"Yes," said Robb, reflectively, "like the rest of us....  You know, I
+rather like the boy; he seems anxious to do his best."
+
+Castle made no reply, but left the manager's office suddenly, as though
+disgusted at not having found satisfaction there.  The manager sighed,
+deeply enough for Evan to hear, and murmured audibly:
+
+"Mollycoddles, all of us!"
+
+With that he slammed down his desk-top and reached for his hat with one
+hand and a half-smoked cigar with the other.  When the front door
+closed behind him Watson and Perry engaged in a rough-and-tumble.  A
+heavy ruler rolled to the floor with a bang, Porter's big boot struck a
+fixture, and various other accidents contributed to the hubbub.
+
+"My ----, cut it out!" shrieked the helpless teller, glowing with wrath.
+
+Watson made a grab for him, but he rushed into his cage and locked the
+door.  The combatants were puffing too hard to speak, or one of them at
+least would probably have vented some sarcasm.  Evan eyed the
+proceedings approvingly; it was a relief to witness a little disorder
+where the orderly teller-accountant ruled.  Porter, with all his
+boneheadedness, was a match for any man in the office, including the
+manager, when it came to the primitive way of "managing" affairs; Evan
+was compelled to admire his physique and the tenacity with which he
+clung to an opponent.  After all "the porter" possessed certain
+qualities not to be despised.  But Watson hit the point uppermost in
+Nelson's mind.
+
+"Port," he said gasping, "if you would wrestle with your job as
+gallantly as you do with an antagonist you'd soon be chief inspector."
+
+Perry grinned.
+
+"Come on, Bill," he coaxed, "put me next to this dope."
+
+Bill bent over him and laid down the law.  Evan finished his mail.  The
+teller brushed the office from him with a whisk, and, adjusting his tie
+and hat to a nicety, walked out into the streets to be admired by the
+female population of Mt. Alban.
+
+An hour later the "swipe" was diligently dusting the front office, his
+back to the door, when someone entered the bank.  Thinking it was
+Porter he did not look up, but went on with his work.  There was a
+sickening dusty smell in the office: the aftermath of a broom.
+
+"Hello, there," said Robb; "do you work all the time, Nelson?"
+
+Evan looked up with an apologetic smile, and, hurriedly dusting the
+manager's chair, made as though to leave the sanctum.
+
+"Don't run away, my boy," said the manager; "I came in on purpose to
+see you.  Sit down."
+
+The junior obeyed.
+
+"How do you like banking by this time?"
+
+"Pretty well, sir, thank you," said Evan timidly.
+
+Mr. Robb looked at him disconcertingly during a pause.
+
+"Who advised you to join a bank staff, Nelson?" he asked, slowly.
+
+"It was my own idea, Mr. Robb.  I felt as though I had gone to school
+long enough at my father's expense.  He earns his bread hard and I
+began to feel it was up to me to do something for myself."
+
+"Oh, I see," said the manager, pensively.  Again he was silent.
+
+"Did you say you wanted to see me about something?" ventured the new
+junior.
+
+"Well--I--I was just wondering, Nelson, if you had taken up with the
+bank just as a sort of notion, and if you had I was going to discourage
+you."
+
+"Don't you think it's a good business, Mr. Robb?"
+
+"Sure--sure--it's all right.  That is, for certain ones.  You'll
+probably be quitting it when you get older."
+
+Evan did not reply immediately.  He was trying to figure out what the
+manager meant.
+
+"I hope I'll get along well," he said, finally.
+
+"I hope so, Nelson; you deserve it; I'll do all I can for you.  But the
+bank is rather uncertain, you know.  We are all--well, more or less
+servants.  Even I get my call-downs regularly.  You didn't know that,
+eh?  Well, you'll get wise to a whole lot of things as time goes on.
+However, I don't want to discourage you.  Do your best wherever you
+are."
+
+Mr. Robb puffed his cigar into life before continuing.
+
+"Don't take things too seriously, though.  Now Mr. Castle, for
+instance--anything he says just swallow it with a few grains of salt.
+He's got bank blue-blood in his veins, you know.  And this sweeping and
+dusting--don't be so particular.  You should be out playing ball or
+tennis.  I must get a woman to clean up from now on.  The last manager
+here started this business, but I'm going to stop it.  I didn't say
+anything while Perry was on the job because it helped break him in to
+the habit of discipline--but you don't need a schoolmaster; in fact,
+you need a sporting coach....  Here, do you smoke?"
+
+Evan declined the cigar with thanks.
+
+"You're right," said Robb, "it's a poor habit....  Was there nothing in
+your home town that attracted you?" he asked suddenly.
+
+"What do you mean--a business?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"No, sir.  There doesn't seem to be anything so good as the bank for a
+young fellow."
+
+"That's right," smiled the manager; "there doesn't seem to be.  The
+only thing some people in this country can see is the bank."
+
+The junior looked surprised.  Robb smiled satirically.
+
+"A little of it won't do you any harm though, Nelson.  Stay with it for
+a while, since you have left school for good, and something else will
+come along....  How do you like your boarding-house?"
+
+"All right, sir."
+
+When the manager had gone Nelson sat submerged in thought.  He came to
+the conclusion that Mr. Robb had "some kick coming" or he would not
+give the banking business such cheap mention.  He was swayed by the
+prejudice of his boyhood days when the bank boys of Hometon were the
+big dogs; and by the well-remembered expectations of his dear mother:
+"We're going to have a banker in our family!"
+
+The same evening Evan was perched on a stool stamping a pad of "forms"
+when Watson entered.
+
+"Hello, Nelson," casually.  "There wasn't a phone call for me, was
+there?"
+
+"No, I didn't hear any, Mr. Watson."
+
+Bill turned his face and grinned.  By and by he focused his black eyes
+on the new "swipe."
+
+"How do you like banking by this time?" he asked soberly.
+
+"I'm beginning to like it better," said Evan.
+
+After a pause: "You know, they're apt to move a fellow any time; even
+you might be moved.  You've got along a whole lot better than most
+juniors, and I wouldn't be sur----"
+
+The ledger keeper broke off--the telephone was ringing.  He took down
+the receiver and began to talk loudly enough for Evan to hear.
+
+"Yes, long distance.  Where?  Toronto!  All right.  Hello.  Yes, this
+is the S---- Bank, Mt. Alban.  Yes, this is one of the clerks.  Who?
+..."
+
+Watson put his hand over the mouthpiece and whispered excitedly to the
+staring junior:
+
+"It's the inspector!"  Then he continued to speak: "Yes, sir, we have
+two junior men here.  Yes, sir, one of them is here now.  Three weeks.
+Yes, he's pretty good.  You want to speak to him, sir?"
+
+Watson turned to Evan.
+
+"Inspector wants you," he said in a businesslike way.
+
+Evan felt his knees weaken.  He stared at the ledger keeper
+despairingly, but bucked up when Watson said:
+
+"Don't keep him waiting--remember he's the inspector."
+
+"Hello," said Nelson, feebly.  "Yes, sir.  I--I suppose so, sir, if the
+b-bank wants me to.  Report there at once?--all right, sir, I'll try--I
+mean I'll report--"
+
+He hung up the receiver and murmured: "Berne!"
+
+"Well," said Watson, like one who had been waiting in suspense for the
+news, "does he want to move you?"
+
+The ledger keeper laughed very hard and called it a good joke.
+
+"But it will mean more money for me, won't it?" asked Evan, anxiously.
+
+"Sure, your salary will probably be doubled.  They may put you on the
+cash there.  It's an out-of-the-way place, you know, and you're
+practically an experienced man by now."
+
+A few minutes later two of the boys from another Mt. Alban bank came to
+the front door and were admitted by Watson.  They formed a semicircle
+around the latest man of the hour in bank moves, and plied him with
+questions.  They appeared to enjoy the thought of his being moved to a
+remote quarter of the province.  The thing finally struck Evan himself
+as funny, and they all indulged in a very satisfactory laugh.  It
+developed later, but not before Evan had telegraphed the exciting news
+home to his mother, that only three out of the four had known what they
+were laughing at.
+
+Soon after a boy enters the bank he begins to look for something
+exciting, in the form of promotion, or a move.  He is given to
+understand that many interesting and profitable changes await every
+bankclerk; he knows not the day nor the hour when he may be transferred
+to far-off green fields, filled with strange girls and other "things"
+to make life pleasant.  It is this ever-growing expectancy which gives
+banking a fascination for young men, especially country boys.  They
+cannot see the day of weariness and monotony that is coming, the day of
+poverty and celibacy, because between that time and the present there
+is a golden glamor, a flame of luring light.  This flame is fanned by
+the windy tongues of reckless clerks and fed with the "oxygen" that
+escapes from head office envelopes.
+
+Evan believed it possible for his reputation to reach the ears of the
+inspector after three weeks' service, and, although he was surprised
+for the moment, he considered it reasonable enough that one of the
+high-up officials should communicate with him over the telephone.  All
+night he counted cash in a nightmare and saw himself signing letters to
+head office as "pro-accountant."  Early the following morning he packed
+his trunk and mentally bade his room good-bye.  On his way to the
+telegraph office, before eight o'clock, he was surprised to meet Mr.
+Castle, the teller.
+
+"I heard about it, Nelson," said Castle, stopping him on the street,
+"and came down to inform you.  This funny work has got to stop."
+
+The teller-accountant was partial to verbs of command.
+
+"What's that?" said Evan, bewilderedly.
+
+Then Castle explained the frame-up, and, leaving the junior to console
+himself on his first big disappointment, went up town to breakfast.
+"Long distance" had meant across the street in a competitive bank.
+
+The feelings of humiliation and chagrin experienced by the poor "swipe"
+were exactly those that come to all bankboys in the days of their
+initiation.  It was the beginning of wisdom for Evan: though the end
+was a long way off.  Just as he had fallen from the position of
+pro-accountant to junior, and from $400 to $200, in one minute, would
+he tumble off many another pinnacle, on his way to solid ground.
+
+It was a week before the Berne sensation died out in the "banking
+circles" of Mt. Alban.  It expired one balance night, the end of the
+month of May.  Everything but work must be forgotten in a bank when
+balance day comes.
+
+The manager was back at his desk by seven o'clock, the teller in his
+cage a few minutes later, Watson turned up about seven-thirty--the
+savings-man had taken no nourishment at all.  With a pair of red ears
+and a mouth full of indelible he sat propped up to his savings ledger,
+the picture of idiocy.  His lips moved unintelligibly as he slowly
+crawled up a long row of figures, smearing the sheet en route.  At
+regular intervals he stopped in the middle of a column, muttered
+profane repetitions, and started at the bottom again.  Watson cast a
+twinkling eye on poor Perry.
+
+"Hadn't you better graze, Port?"
+
+No reply.  This was a fight to the finish with Porter.  His opponent
+had him throttled, but still he was game.  The current-account
+ledgerman laughed ecstatically to himself.  Castle was annoyed.
+
+"Don't laugh, Watson," he said, again using his favorite imperative,
+"you'll have to balance the savings yourself anyway."
+
+Bill Watson squinted through the wire at his fellow-clerk.
+
+"The 'Rules and Regulations' put that up to the accountant," he said,
+still smiling.  Castle ripped a blotted sheet out of his "blotter," but
+made no answer.
+
+Evan had hurried through with his mail and his supper, and was now
+intensely occupied in adding the interest table.  He was shown an
+out-of-date table with figures at the bottom of each page, and told
+that every month the junior had to add those stereotyped columns.  Like
+all bank beginners, Nelson did not use his brains.  Juniors are taught
+(1) to obey, (2) to work, (3) to ask no foolish questions.  No matter
+how absurd a task appears, perform it without a kick.  The
+happy-go-lucky boys take a chance and ask questions rather than do what
+seems to be unnecessary work; but Evan was the conscientious kind, the
+kind that obeys unquestioningly and never lets up until fully convinced
+of error.  There is a noble six hundred in the bank, as well as the
+army; but in the bank the number is greater than six hundred.
+
+Perry was working hard this balance-night, but not from a sense of
+duty--he wanted to show the management that he could balance that
+savings ledger.  Porter was a bulldog; Evan more like a sleigh-dog.
+
+The manager and the teller-accountant left the office about eleven
+o'clock.  Watson was "out" a small amount in the current ledgers, but
+had left them to take down a new set of balances for Porter.  Yawning
+hopelessly, Perry leaned against the desk, wondering how on earth he
+had ever managed to be out $396,492.11 in a ledger with deposits of
+only $400,000.....
+
+The town of Mt. Alban was silent.  The main street was in darkness,
+except for the gleam that came from the windows of three bank
+buildings.  It was past midnight, but out of twenty bankboys in the
+town, fifteen were still working.
+
+In one of the banks a young clerk slept, with his head on his hands and
+his hands on an interest table.  The ledger-keeper found him thus.
+
+"Too dang bad," he said to Perry; "I forgot all about him....  Hey,
+Nelson, it's morning!"
+
+Evan raised his head and opened his eyes.  Watson smiled good-naturedly.
+
+"It's a shame to kid you," he said.  "This was another bum steer.  But
+the practice in adding won't hurt you, eh?"
+
+Nelson stumbled up the back stairs and fell asleep on his bed to the
+tune of an adding-machine, run by Porter.  In his dreams he stood at
+the foot of a mighty column--of figures.  It reached to the clouds.  A
+ghostly friend of Jack-in-the-Beanstalk's whispered to him that he must
+climb that column if he would reach Success.  Evan began the ascent.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+_A MAN OF THE WORLD._
+
+Miraculous as it seemed to Evan, the ledgers were finally made to
+balance.  Porter lengthened his stride a foot and walked once more well
+back on his heels--just as if his bad work had not been responsible for
+a three days' dizzy mixup.  A certain Saturday afternoon came round.
+
+"I guess we can do without you till Monday noon," said the manager,
+over Nelson's shoulder, as the latter pondered over an unwritten
+money-order.
+
+It was welcome news to Evan.  He had come to feel, however, that his
+presence was indispensable to the well-being of the collection register
+and other books of record.  It appeared to him that in one afternoon
+and a forenoon the hand of any other but himself must irrevocably
+"ball" the junior post.
+
+"You mean you don't want me to drive back Sunday night?" he asked Mr.
+Robb, doubtingly.
+
+"That's what.  You'd better take all the holidays you can get now,
+Nelson; you'll be tied tighter than wax-end before you're in the
+business long."
+
+Evan seemed still perplexed.
+
+"Who'll take out the drafts Monday morning, Mr. Robb?" he asked,
+seriously.
+
+The manager looked at him with an expression half humor and half pity.
+
+"Do you suppose," he said with a grin, "that the merchants will be very
+badly offended at not getting these bills at the earliest moment?"
+
+Evan smiled.  Robb still stood beside him.
+
+"Evan! ....."
+
+He looked up, surprised to hear himself addressed so familiarly by the
+manager; but the latter was speaking:
+
+".... Remember this: extra holidays never save you labor.  The work is
+always waiting for your return, piling up through every hour of your
+pleasure."
+
+Mr. Robb sighed and walked into his office, leaving the new junior to
+absorb another impression.  The words spoken did impress Nelson.  He
+sat gazing before him at the wall, wondering why the manager was so
+friendly toward him and so cynical on matters of business.  From
+looking at nothingness his eyes gradually focused on a calendar, and at
+an "X" mark in pencil thereon.  The mark indicated the day when he
+would make a trip home to tell about "the world": that day had come.
+
+With a smile he laid aside the money-order he had been examining and
+began straightening up his desk, whistling as he did so.  Castle, out
+in his cash, was annoyed.
+
+"Will you kindly stop that whistling," he commanded in his high tones.
+
+"Excuse me," said the junior quickly, "I wasn't thinking."
+
+"Well you want to think," returned Castle.
+
+"No you don't," called Watson; "you'll get h--l if you dare to think.
+As the hymn says, 'Trust and obey'--but for heaven's sake don't think.
+Now _I_ think--"
+
+"Shut up, Bill," interposed Perry, "I've been up this column twice
+already."
+
+Bill opened his eyes and leered down on the savings man.
+
+"Look who's here," he said, facetiously.  "Why, it's the new ledger
+keeper; the great-grandson of Burroughs, and inventor of the new system
+of adding--the system which says: Go up a column three times and if the
+totals agree there is something wrong; mistrust them; get the other man
+to add it."
+
+Porter scowled.  Castle could scarcely repress a smile, but he dug his
+nose into a bunch of dirty money, and managed to turn his thoughts to
+microbes and other sober subjects.
+
+Evan, his grip packed, stood apologetically behind the cage, waiting
+for the teller to turn around.
+
+"What do _you_ want?" said Castle.
+
+"Cash this cheque, will you, please?"
+
+A smile wavered on Watson's lip.  Porter felt in his pockets.  The
+teller grinned.
+
+"Hardly worth while keeping that in an account," he said, with the
+intention of joking.  It was a wonder, too, for he seldom tried to be
+funny with inferiors.
+
+"I wouldn't have even that," replied Evan, "if it weren't for the
+account."
+
+Bill haw-hawed.
+
+"You're no humorist, Castle," he said.
+
+The teller was red and white in an instant.  The ledger keeper never
+had shown him any respect; he had called him Mister but a few times,
+and that was just after Bill had come from another branch.  Castle was
+smaller than Watson and possessed an inferior personality.  Bill was
+big and humorous--and reckless.  It was the joy of his life to torment
+the teller; and yet he was not mean; he was not even obstreperous; he
+got along splendidly with the manager, and showed him respect.
+
+The teller's anger exhausted itself inwardly.  Evan still stood with
+his grip in his hand looking at the boys working behind their desks.
+He felt that he ought to bid them good-bye, but he did not like to do
+it individually, and it was almost as hard to say a general farewell.
+
+"Good-bye," he called faintly from the front door.  Castle did not
+raise his head.  Porter and Bill lifted theirs, but only to grin.  The
+manager stepped out of his office and extended his hand with a smile.
+
+"Have a good time," he said, and whispered: "Monday night will do, if
+your mother kicks very hard."
+
+"Thank you, Mr. Robb, I----"
+
+"That's all right."
+
+On the train Evan rejoiced.  He thought of the sad day he had landed at
+the station of Mt. Alban with lonesomeness and misgivings; of the
+thrills of discouragement and homesickness that had tortured him for
+the first two weeks; of the blank explanations of "the porter," and
+ensuing jumbles of figures and bills; and of his first look at that bed
+above the vault.  It all seemed to have happened at a remote period in
+his life--probably in the pre-existent land; even balance day, but
+three days past, was remote.
+
+It was not in these seemingly ancient memories that Evan had his
+rejoicing, but in the realization that they were memories.  As the
+train carried him buoyantly toward Hometon he recounted the
+accomplishments he had acquired in four or five weeks.  He could add
+twice as rapidly as any high-school student in the average collegiate;
+he knew the collection register and diary; he could enter up a
+savings-bank passbook better than Perry--with a clearer hand and a much
+clearer comprehension; he could draw a draft, reckon dates of maturity
+without a calendar; and so on.  But, what he prized most, he was
+familiar with a host of technical terms, used in the banking business
+the world over.  And after buying his ticket and purchasing a hat-pin
+for his sister, Lou, he had two dollars of his own money in his pocket.
+That would buy up most of the ice-cream in Hometon, for one evening
+anyway.
+
+Such thoughts and reflections as these kept Evan interested until the
+brakeman shouted "Hometon next!"  Then a lofty and exulting happiness
+took the place of interest.  He looked on the approaching spires and
+humble cupolas of his home town with an expression possibly similar to
+that of an eagle in flight over a settlement of earthy creatures.  He
+felt a sudden loyalty for Mt. Alban, and suspected that it would be
+part of his professionalism to maintain the honor of his business-town
+in Hometon.
+
+The bankclerk straightened his back and marched down the aisle of the
+train.  Alfred Castle and the interest table seemed a thousand miles
+away.  Two happy faces smiled at him from the station platform.
+Frankie Arling and Sister Lou ran up to him.
+
+"Gee, but isn't he a sport?" said Lou, sweeping him in from tip to toe,
+and addressing herself to her companion.
+
+"Yes, indeed," laughed Frankie, taking his raincoat from his arm, and
+throwing it over her own.  Lou seized his suitcase.
+
+He submitted to the hold-up with a kind of dignity; looked about him
+with the air of a tourist; and paid less attention to the questions of
+the girls than he might have done.
+
+"The old town's just the same," he soliloquized aloud.
+
+Lou was speaking to a passer-by and did not hear the remark.  Frankie
+had been paying better attention.  She smiled and looked into his face
+coyly.
+
+"Does it seem so very long since you left, Evan?"
+
+"Well--I don't know, Frank."  He regarded her critically.  Lou was
+attending now.
+
+"I expected to find you with a moustache," she said.
+
+The remark fitted so well into Frankie's thoughts it amused her very
+much.  Both girls laughed to each other without restraint.  In fact,
+they were not very sedate for the main street of Hometon.
+
+Mrs. Nelson had the house as clean and cheerful as mother and a
+summer's day can make a home.  She sat on the front verandah with the
+material for a pair of pyjamas on her white-aproned lap.  Long before
+the three youngsters were within hailing distance she waved the light
+flannelette above her head.
+
+Evan's kiss made the mother blush.  There never had been much
+demonstration of affection in the family: there had been no excuse for
+it.  But now matters were different.  Evan, too, was a trifle
+embarrassed.
+
+"Well, I like that," said Lou; "he never kissed me, mother!"
+
+He caught his sister and bestowed a gentle bite on her cheek; she
+squirmed and would not let him away without a conventional kiss.  When
+he had satisfied her, Lou glanced at the brother and then at Frankie.
+
+"Someone else to be smacked," she said, stopping Frankie's flight by
+winding her arms around the twisting waist.
+
+Evan was ready to turn the whole affair into a joke, and shouting "I'm
+game," he caught Frankie and pressed his lips to hers.
+
+Again Mrs. Nelson blushed.  So did Miss Arling.
+
+"Gee!" cried Lou; "I just thought that's what the bank did for fellows."
+
+Evan was thus acknowledged a regular bankclerk, and the laugh he vented
+was well tinctured with exultation.
+
+Then began a series of questions and answers, recitations and
+interruptions, commendations and exaggerations.  For two hours the
+mother, the son and the two wide-eyed girls listened and looked, or
+asked and received.  The expressions Evan used puzzled them, but he
+shook his head deprecatingly when they asked for definitions which he
+knew would be unintelligible to them.  He had not been talking with
+them long before he discovered how to interest them--by saying
+mysterious things.  From the moment of his discovery he revelled in the
+clerical technical phrases that he had picked up at the Mt. Alban
+office, and the women justified the assertion of that circus man who
+said: "Humanity likes to be humbugged."
+
+Lou, with a new and sudden affection for housework, insisted on getting
+the supper.  Mrs. Nelson, of course, could not consent to it on this
+the night of her banker's return; nobody's hands but her own must lay
+the cloth and mix the salad.  But Lou was strangely insistent, and the
+upshot of the competition was co-operation.  Evan was left on the
+verandah with Frankie.
+
+No doubt there is a time for everything.  That was the time for Evan to
+tell how lonesome he had been....  And this is the time to make a brief
+sketch of Miss Arling.  Her face was sweet, then it was thoughtful; her
+eyes were blue-green, bright.  She looked not unlike Love's
+incarnation.  She bore a strong resemblance to a baby.  In short, she
+was--what her best friends called her--a dear.
+
+"You don't know how I have missed you, Frank," said Evan, and when she
+gave him a scrutinizing look, he hurriedly added: "a fellow gets so
+lonesome, you know."
+
+"Do you like the bank, Evan?" she asked, fencing.
+
+"You bet.  A fellow gets such a good insight into--things."
+
+"You were a dandy at school," she observed seriously.
+
+He eyed her suspiciously.  He was no longer a school-boy.  He repeated
+a remark he had heard in the office:
+
+"If a fellow goes to school all his life he misses the education of
+business.  That's how it is so many professional men fall down when it
+comes to collecting accounts."
+
+Frankie regarded him with a smile in which considerable admiration
+shone.  She was just a girl of seventeen.
+
+"I suppose it must be nice to make your own living," she said, and,
+after thinking a moment, "awfully nice!"
+
+"You bet.  I got tired of seeing Dad come home for meals all tuckered
+out, to find me playing ball on the lawn or reading literature on the
+verandah."
+
+He cast his eyes toward Main Street.  The village bell announced the
+evening meal, and a familiar figure walked toward the home of George
+Nelson, village merchant.
+
+"There he comes, Frankie," said Evan, unconsciously sighing; "that step
+will always remind me of summer evenings and studious noon hours."
+
+The bankclerk felt a sudden desire to work hard and repay his father
+for the consideration shown him at school.  The village merchant would
+have been willing to help his boy through any college in the country,
+and the boy knew it.  He felt proud of his start in business, of the
+paltry two dollars in his pocket, as he watched his father approach.
+
+Mr. Nelson waved his hat when he saw Evan on the verandah; and when he
+came up,--
+
+"Hey," he laughed, "it's a wonder you wouldn't call into a fellow's
+store and say good-day."
+
+Evan shook hands heartily, smiling into the blue eyes that had more
+than once cowed him with a glance, when he was performing some
+ridiculous feat of boyhood.
+
+"I understand," said the father, before Evan could make an excuse;
+"it's up to Ma.  I'm surprised she leaves you alone out here with a
+young lady."
+
+Perceiving the effect of his remark on Frankie, George Nelson laughed
+merrily and pinched the girl's cheek.
+
+Soon the glad family was seated at a supper table, Mrs. Nelson's
+table--that is description enough.  Frankie knew she was not an
+intruder.  She was there as Lou's companion, not as Evan's sweetheart.
+She knew Evan wanted her to be there, her mother knew it, his mother
+knew it, everybody knew it.  The whole town knew it.  Things might as
+well be done in the open, in Hometon, for they would out anyway.
+
+"How's business, Dad?" asked Evan, in quite a business tone.
+
+"Oh, just the same.  We continue to buy butter for twenty-five cents
+and sell it retail at twenty-three cents.  Joe breaks about the same
+number of eggs a day, and John is still good opposition.  Well--how do
+you like the bank?"
+
+"Fine," said Evan immediately; "the manager says he is going to push me
+along."
+
+"Isn't that just splendid," exclaimed the mother, joyously.
+
+"That depends," said Mr. Nelson, mischievously, "what is meant by being
+pushed along.  If it means a move some hundreds of miles away----"
+
+Mrs. Nelson sighed after vainly trying to smile.  She was singularly
+quiet for a while.  Her husband was enjoying himself immensely.  He was
+an optimist, his wife inclined to pessimism.  George Nelson believed in
+making the best of things that had already happened and making nothing
+of things to come until they came.  Caroline, his wife, lived a great
+many of her troubles in advance.  At the same time, the father was as
+"sentimental" as the mother in the teeth of happenings.  He could
+suffer as much beneath a smile as she could behind tears.  Encouraging
+the boy, however, was making the best of matters, and Mr. Nelson was
+going to do his part.
+
+"Perhaps it's just as well you did quit school, Evan," he said
+cheerfully; "they say the new principal isn't up to much."
+
+After that the conversation alternated between school and the bank, and
+Evan was enabled to gather valuable material for the institution of
+comparisons.  He launched out in the direction of a bank and kicked
+back-water schoolward.  He managed so well no one had the heart to duck
+him; his friends had compassion on him in his young enthusiasm.  But in
+spite of the consent silence is supposed to lend, Evan felt that he was
+scarcely convincing.  An atmosphere of good old days was thrown about
+him; Frankie seemed to be dropping suggestions continually that took
+him back to the classroom, where Literature and History charmed, or
+upon the ball field, where Mike Malone swung his long leg and his
+barnyard boot.  A little opposition would have given the bankclerk a
+keener interest in the conversation; the reiteration of "yes" seemed to
+make him doubt his own arguments.
+
+But Evan was not to be disheartened by imaginings.  He used more of his
+technical talk on the "Dad," though with less effect than he had
+observed on the women, and, as a sort of clincher, divulged a little of
+the bank's business.  The father took an interest there.
+
+"Do you mean to say they've got deposits amounting to that?" he said,
+postponing a bite.
+
+Mrs. Nelson lighted up.  Evan was coming out.
+
+"Isn't it grand," she cried, "to think your bank is so strong, Evan.
+Just think of all those deposits."
+
+"Humph!" grunted the father, "and a fellow can't get a loan to save his
+neck."
+
+He stole a look at his son, but Evan was not familiar with loans, yet.
+His first business in that direction was going to be done with Watson,
+a few days later.  Mr. Nelson's hint affecting the management of a bank
+passed over Evan's head, for Evan was a clerk, not a banker.  When it
+came to actual banking the father knew much more than our banker did,
+but his knowledge was not comprehensible to the boy, much less to Mrs.
+Nelson.  The "Dad" could only eat his baked potato, look at his dish of
+strawberries--and trust to the future.
+
+Saturday evening was a small triumph for Evan.  He walked up and down
+the village street with Frankie and Lou, ravaged the refreshment
+parlors, chatted at every crossing with a bevy of old schoolmates, and
+spent an enjoyable and typically "village" night.
+
+Sunday morning was bright, and the Nelson family was gay.  The word
+"bank" reverberated throughout the kitchen, the dining-room and parlor,
+floated around the verandah, tinkled among the Chinese jingles clinking
+in the breeze, and bounced like a ball on the lawn.  Evan was happy all
+forenoon.  And he talked a great deal at dinner.
+
+After dinner, though, Our Banker's mind took a business turn.  He
+thought of what the manager had said to him about work piling up and
+waiting for the clerk.  While he sat for a few moments alone on the
+verandah he mentally sorted over a bunch of bills, entered them up
+wrong, heard Castle's squawking voice, and eventually yawned over a
+heap of mail.  He found several envelopes returned from wrong banks and
+was (still mentally) expecting a memo from head office about them.
+
+His father came quietly out of the house and took a chair beside him,
+driving away his routine ruminations.
+
+"Evan," he said seriously, "I had a talk with your old teacher not long
+ago and he said it was a shame for you to quit school just when you
+did.  He said you should have got your matric. at least, so that if
+ever you tired of the bank you could jump right into college.  Now, if
+ever you feel like quitting, remember I'll be only too glad to send you
+back to school."
+
+Those words had an effect exactly the contrary to what was intended.
+Evan felt the force of his father's generosity and unselfishness; he
+was strengthened in his resolve to be independent; not only
+independent, but a help to his father.
+
+"No, Dad," he said; "I'm very fond of bank work, and I know I'll
+succeed."
+
+Both encouragement and discouragement had the effect of spurring Evan
+on.  There was no hope for him: he must go in and play the game--or,
+rather, fight the fight--to a finish.  Then he would know what others
+knew but could not tell him; what Sam Robb knew and would have been
+happy to make every prospective bankclerk understand.
+
+In spite of himself and his surroundings Evan felt the old homesickness
+creeping over him Sunday night.  He had decided to take the first train
+on Monday back to work; he told himself that the hardest way was the
+best way, and he sought a short cut to success.  After church Frankie
+found it difficult to elicit cheerful words from him.
+
+The two strolled along a side street.  Those dear old Ontario villages
+and towns where the boys and girls walk on Sunday nights along
+tree-darkened ways, how long will they listen to the repetitions of
+lovers?  Evan's and Frankie's parents had said the same "foolish"
+things to each other that Evan and Frankie were now saying, and on the
+very same street.  History repeats, but not with the accuracy of Love.
+
+"Some day I'll come home a manager, Frankie," he was saying, "and then
+you and I will get married."
+
+"Oh, I hope so," she answered.
+
+She went to bed that night with a happy young heart, and Evan retired
+feeling sure he loved and would some day marry Frankie Arling.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+_BEING A SPORT._
+
+A sickening sensation took possession of Evan as he boarded the train
+Monday forenoon for Mt. Alban.  He found it hard to banish from his
+thoughts the invitation his father had given him, to return to school
+and the pleasant experiences that made up a school education.
+
+The two young girls waved him good-bye from the platform of Hometon
+station, and it afterwards became known that a tear had stood for a
+second in the bankclerk's eye.
+
+"You needn't have come till night," said the manager, as Evan walked
+solemnly into the office.
+
+The words made Evan more homesick than ever.  One characteristic of the
+disease known as homesickness is a strong tendency toward a relapse.
+One may imagine himself cured, he goes out of his environment,--and
+comes back with a new attack.
+
+Because of the pain occasioned by visiting home Evan decided he would
+stay away several months before making another excursion among
+home-folk.  In this resolve he was unintentionally selfish; his mother
+and his other friends loved to see his face, if it were but for an
+hour.  But young men are always inconsiderate of their loved ones'
+affections.  They probably fear that in humoring their parents and kin
+they will humor themselves to the point of losing their grit.  What
+Evan considered self-preservation was, from the standpoint of the folk
+at home, something resembling neglect or indifference.  When his mother
+received a note from him saying he would not be home till fall, she had
+a "good" cry.  Mr. Nelson smiled, while the women-folk were looking,
+and sighed later.
+
+"Let him go it," he said, cheerily; "it takes these things to make a
+man, you know."
+
+Mrs. Nelson was more resigned after that; she was most anxious to see
+her son "a man."
+
+Frankie was also notified of the rigid resolve.  She felt chilly while
+reading the letter, and postponed an answer for two weeks.  The letter
+she wrote was as follows:
+
+
+"Dear Evan,--I don't see why you should make yourself any further away
+than you really are.  It may not be very much pleasure for you to come
+back to this little burg, but it _is_ nice for us.
+
+"I wrote off my Latin and German papers to-day; to-morrow it's French
+and Literature.  Do you remember how you used to help me guess the
+passages for memorization?  You surely were a lucky guesser.
+
+"If you are dead certain you don't want to come home for all those
+months, you will at least write occasionally and tell us how you are
+getting along.  Mother is calling me now, and I must close.  I hope you
+won't be offended at this letter.
+
+"Sincerely,
+  "FRANK."
+
+
+When Evan received the note from "his" girl he was much excited.  Perry
+had been moved, a new junior had come, and the old junior was promoted
+to savings bank.  Not only was he excited, he was confused.  Besides
+having to actually wait on customers he was obliged to break in the new
+"swipe"; and the latter, sad to tell, was about Porter's speed.
+
+The reply Evan sent Frankie was busy.  It was rushed off to convey the
+good news of promotion, and must necessarily have a business ring.  In
+spite of its brevity, however, it contained two or three new bank
+idioms.
+
+Real work began for Nelson.  Not to say that a juniorship is a
+sinecure: some swipes earn their salaries several times over.  One was
+once known to write the inspector as follows:
+
+"Dear Sir,--I could make more money sawing wood than I can banking."
+
+The following reply came back, through the manager, of course:
+
+"Tell M---- he could earn more money at the job he mentions, but that
+it would not take him so long to learn wood-sawing as it will to learn
+banking."
+
+The inspector might have gone one step further and got to the truth of
+the matter.  One requires no education to saw wood, and no intellect;
+but both education and a certain degree of intelligence must appertain
+to him who would make successful application to a bank; and education
+itself requires an expenditure of time and money.  The ability a young
+man possesses has cost him something and has cost his father or widowed
+mother a great deal.  What right has the bank to use it without paying
+what it is worth?  It ought to be worth a bare living, at least--like
+wood-sawing.
+
+Time flew, for Evan, on his new post.  There is certain excitement
+about bank work, just as there is in playing checkers.  It is said of
+both occupations that they develop the faculties.  Counting the stars
+also strengthens certain brain-tissues.  In fact, there are many
+educational agencies in the world and the universe: it is no trouble to
+find one or a thousand--the difficulty comes in selecting.  He who can
+choose, with open eyes, the factors that shall enter into his
+education, is going to be among the fittest.  But few boys of seventeen
+know where to look; certainly Evan Nelson did not.  He was naturally a
+specialist; that is, he was one to put his whole heart into anything.
+If he had been left to the moulding influence of a university he would
+have fastened upon literature or science and created something for the
+world; but, unfortunately, he was thrown headlong into a
+counting-house, and, being an enthusiast, began to dig among musty
+books with an energy that was, in great measure, wasted--except, to the
+beneficiaries of the concern.
+
+The life he had led at home had given Evan scope for his imagination.
+The life he now led made no demand on his creative powers, with the
+result that his imagination turned away from great things and
+concentrated on little things--like pleasure.
+
+It was the old story, the story that Sam Robb and others knew.  With
+Nelson it began later than usual, but came with a rush in the following
+way:
+
+One night in his room above the vault he sat reading in French a story
+from De Maupassant, a dictionary beside him.  Bill Watson walked into
+the room and sat down with a grunt, and a cigarette.  He lounged back
+in a chair, well-dressed and glossy-looking, and puffed white rings
+upward toward the ceiling.
+
+"Why don't you go out a little, Evan?" he said, casually.
+
+The ledger keepers had become pretty well acquainted by now.  Evan's
+sincerity and energy were telling on the books, too.  Even Castle had
+spoken nicely to him one day.
+
+"Out where?" asked Evan, looking away from the French fiction.
+
+"To parties.  Where did you think I meant--out in the back yard?"
+
+"I don't know many people yet," replied the savings man.
+
+"You never will, either, unless you make a break.  Say, kid, there's a
+party on to-night.  I can get you a pass.  Will you come?"
+
+"It's too late," parried Evan.
+
+Bill regarded him with a look of pity.
+
+"Don't ever make a break like that to a girl in this town," he said,
+smiling, "or she'll take you for a greeny.  People don't go to dances
+at eight o'clock, you know--not in Mt. Alban."
+
+Nelson felt embarrassed.  Watson was talking on:
+
+"It helps business, you know.  Customers like to know the fellows who
+are looking after their money.  They like to think you take an interest
+in them."
+
+Evan closed his book quickly.
+
+"I'm not afraid to go to the hanged party," he said suddenly.
+
+"That's talking, Nelsy.  Get busy, then.  You've got nothing to shave,
+so it shouldn't take you long to get ready."
+
+Before long the new savings man presented himself dressed for the
+dance.  Bill regarded him with concealed amusement.
+
+"Say, Evan," he said softly, "could you lend us a dollar?  I think
+there's something in my account, but I forgot to draw it this
+afternoon."
+
+Evan knew there was nothing in Bill's account, but he could not refuse
+the trifling loan.  He wondered how Watson could spend eight dollars a
+week, when his board only cost him three dollars and a half.
+
+In return for the loan Bill did his best to make Evan feel comfortable
+at the dance.  Now the savings man knew nothing about dancing, and he
+was equally ignorant of cards.  He found girls at the party anxious to
+teach him the former, and married ladies ready to give him "a hand."
+With thought of Watson's recently delivered words fresh in his mind, he
+began to learn new ways of making himself valuable to the bank.  He
+would ingratiate himself with the customers.
+
+Two members of the party were particularly agreeable "customers."  Evan
+discovered that there were some very interesting girls in Mt. Alban.
+One of the two belles paid Watson great attention and the other seemed
+partial to Evan himself; both treated him exceedingly well.
+
+"She's a bird, isn't she, Nelson?" observed Watson, when the two
+bankclerks were alone for a moment.
+
+"You bet.  That dark hair of hers is mighty becoming."
+
+Watson laughed.
+
+"I mean the other, you jackass.  Mine."
+
+"Oh," said Nelson, absently.
+
+The following day Julia Watersea came into the bank and deposited some
+money with the teller.  Evan felt his face fill up when he saw the red
+passbook--it meant she would have to face him before the transaction
+was finished.
+
+"How are you to-day?" he asked, working hard on the book and trying to
+look professional.
+
+"Very well, thank you, Mr. Nelson.  By the way, do you like picnics?"
+
+Bill kicked him from behind.
+
+"Yes--yes, indeed," said Evan, quickly.
+
+"Well, we girls are getting one up for Saturday afternoon.  Could you
+and Mr. Watson come?"
+
+Bill rushed up to the savings wicket.
+
+"Could we?" he cried, smiling at the dark-haired girl.  "Can we?"
+
+"All right," said Julia, with color; "we're going to meet at our place."
+
+De Maupassant and the dictionary were doomed.  Bill warmed up to the
+junior ledgerman now that the latter was growing sociable.  He
+periodically forgot to put a cheque through during bank hours,
+preferring to do his business through Evan.
+
+Miss Watersea's picnic happened, and it was a good one.  Evan enjoyed
+himself so well he forgot to write Frankie her weekly letter.  He would
+have had to mention Julia in it, anyway, and perhaps it was as well to
+omit writing altogether.
+
+The girl Bill called his was something like Lou Nelson.  Evan felt at
+home in her company, but she did not attract him in the same way Julia
+did.  Hazel Morton had more fire in her than either Lou or Julia--that,
+Evan said to himself, was how it was she held Bill Watson.  Bill was
+not at all easy to hold.
+
+In the day when Evan Nelson was a savings ledgerman, bankclerks in
+Eastern towns were nicknamed "village idols."  The title was quite
+appropriate, too.  Even yet bankboys are looked for and looked after in
+those towns.  It is quite natural that they should be, for they are a
+good class of fellows.  The worst that can be said about them, as a
+rule, concerns their prospects; and it is to the credit of young women
+that they do not take a man's means into account when they want to
+fancy him.
+
+After the picnic Bill and Evan were alone above the vault.  The
+current-account man was moody.
+
+"Kid," he said, impulsively, "it's ---- to be poor, isn't it?  Why
+don't you kick once in a while?  The only decent kicker we have around
+this dump is Robb.  He's all right."
+
+Evan smiled pensively.
+
+"---- it," continued Watson, "I don't see why a fellow can't earn
+enough to--to--"
+
+"Get married on?" suggested Evan, who was, at the same moment thinking
+of an ideal composed of Frankie Arling and Julia Watersea.
+
+"Sure!  Why not?"
+
+"Would you really like to get married, Bill?"
+
+"Yes, I would."
+
+"So would I."
+
+Watson was forced to laugh.  He was twenty--that was bad enough.  But
+Nelson was not yet eighteen.  Bill continued to gaze at the serious
+face of his companion until his own countenance changed.  Instead of
+speaking or sighing he lighted a cigarette.
+
+"Will you have one, Nelsy?"
+
+Evan shook his head.
+
+"Do you think Julia would object?"
+
+"What's she got to do with me?" challenged Nelson.
+
+"Why, she's your girl, man.  Sailors have sweethearts in every port,
+you know, and bankers in every town."
+
+Evan tried to connect sailors and sweethearts with cigarettes, but just
+at that time was unable to establish anything but a far-fetched
+relationship.  Later in life, on the Bowery, he thought he saw the
+connection.
+
+In the midst of parties and picnics balance day loomed up.  Castle's
+frame of mind, like a special make of barometer, registered the event a
+day or so in advance.
+
+"Have you got your ledger proved up?" he asked Evan.
+
+"Pretty well, I think."
+
+Under Bill's tutelage, Evan had dropped the "sir" when speaking to
+Castle.
+
+"Remember, the interest has to be computed this month.  Watson, it will
+be up to you to check it."
+
+"I'm not the accountant," said Bill, chewing gum with a smacking noise.
+"I'll help him make it up, though."
+
+Mr. Robb came to the cage door for some change, and the teller referred
+the matter to him.
+
+"Oh, do your best with it, boys," he said.  "I'm strong for
+co-operation.  There isn't enough of it among the staff."
+
+Castle turned away with a sneer.
+
+"I've got the liability," he said, sulkingly.
+
+"I'll take charge of that this time," returned Robb; "give the boys a
+hand at the savings, Alf.  And say, Watson, get the cash book written
+up early so that I can post the general, will you?"
+
+"All right, sir," said Bill, cheerily.
+
+Evan experienced a thrill as these orders were passed around.  He felt
+that he was part of a great system.  The names of ledgers and
+balance-books sounded pleasant to him, for he was daily learning
+considerable about them.  Their puzzles were solving and their
+mysteries dissolving before his constant gaze.  He felt like an
+engineer lately on the job, or a new chauffeur, only more mighty.
+
+His sense of greatness waned, though, toward midnight on balance day.
+The savings ledger was out an ugly amount.  Bill was also in straits.
+
+"It's a wonder to me," he growled, as the two plodded along alone in
+the semi-darkness, "that bankclerks don't go nutty."
+
+Evan was scaling a column and did not answer.  Watson continued,
+keeping time with the adding machine.
+
+"Work, work, work; doggone them, it's a wonder they wouldn't ask for a
+few more particulars on this ledger-sheet.  Why, in heaven's name, do
+they want the names of customers down at head office?  They don't know
+these ginks here, and never will.  If they don't believe our totals,
+why don't they come and look over the books?  Oh, ----!"
+
+"Hurrah!" shouted Nelson, cavorting around his desk.
+
+Bill knew the savings man must have struck a balance, but he was too
+sorely irritated to show enthusiasm.
+
+"Why don't you pat me on the back, Bill?"
+
+"Shut up.  Anybody could balance that passbook of a ledger."
+
+Evan cooled down and remained quiet a while.  Bill, thinking he had
+offended his companion, soon looked across with an apologetic smile.
+Nelson was staring wildly at his totals.
+
+"What's the matter?" asked Watson, well acquainted with vacant looks in
+bankclerk faces on balance night.
+
+"I--I thought I was balanced.  It seems to be one cent out."
+
+The reaction struck Bill as funny, because it duplicated experiences he
+had had and seen, but he made an effort to suppress his mirth.  He
+laughed silently upon his own unbalanced return-sheet until his nervous
+system was satisfied, then he spoke.
+
+"Evan."
+
+"What do you want?" sourly.
+
+"Did you ever hear the story about the maid who counted her chickens
+before they were?"
+
+Evan scowled and raced up and down his columns in search of the stray
+cent.  He did not find it.  Bill took pity, seeing that he would not
+have to go past the units column, and proved Evan's totals.  But the
+cent still hid.
+
+"I'll bet it's in the calling," he said, grinning.  "Do you know what
+that means?"
+
+"No."
+
+"It means you will have to tick off a whole month's work.  And
+remember, we've got the interest to make up, too.  No parties this
+week, kiddo.  No more Julias for yours.  She'll have another fancier by
+the time you're unearthed from this junk-heap."
+
+Nelson wondered how Watson could make light of so gloomy a matter.  He
+took his own work very seriously, as most bankboys have to.  Bill often
+worried, but not about his work.  When he changed pillows it was a
+question of finance.
+
+"Cheer up, Nelsy," he said, carelessly, "things always turn up.
+Remember the old motto: 'It took Noah six hundred years to learn how to
+build an ark; don't lose your grit.'  I'll fish you out if you get too
+far under water."
+
+Evan was not fond of the idea of being fished out.  He wanted to swim
+unaided.
+
+But he failed.  All next day he worried over his "difference," giving a
+start whenever one cent detached itself from an amount.  In the evening
+Bill called off the ledger to him.  When they were nearing the end he
+called an amount one cent wrong.
+
+"What's that, what's that?" Evan repeated, excitedly.
+
+Bill called it again, but rightly.  He chuckled quietly for a little
+space, greatly to Nelson's aggravation.
+
+It was midnight the first of the month.  The savings man struggled
+alone with his balance; the desks swam around the office and figures
+danced like devils before him.
+
+"D--!" he muttered.
+
+That was one of his first legitimate swear-words at Mt. Alban--but
+others would come.  The recording angel up above might as well open an
+account first as last, for one more human being had entered a bank.
+
+The front door jarred and some of the bankboys entered.  Bill was not
+quite sober, and one of his companions had, what he himself insisted
+was, "about half a bun."
+
+"Don't work all night, Nelsy," said Watson, "th-there's another d-day
+coming."
+
+"Sure, lots 'em," said the half-intoxicated one.
+
+A teller from one of the other Mt. Alban banks extended a box of
+cigarettes toward Nelson.
+
+"No thanks!"
+
+"By heck, it helps a fellow a whole lot when he's tired," said the
+teller; "come on--just one."
+
+Even felt fagged from hours of bootless labor.  He hesitated, almost
+stupidly, and the bankclerk pushed the box rapidly into his hand.  He
+figured it would be childish to refuse after that--and accepted his
+first cigarette.
+
+It did help him, for the moment.  After a few puffs he began to be
+amused at Bill's words and actions.
+
+"Close up shop," said Bill, recklessly; "to ---- with honest endeavor."
+
+"How much are you out?" asked the alien teller.
+
+"One dirty little copper," said Bill, answering for his desk-mate.
+
+"Let's have a look," said the teller.  "This is against the rules, I
+know--"
+
+"Aw, bury the rules," cried Watson.
+
+While the teller looked Evan's difference loomed up as big as a
+mountain.  The tired savings clerk had stumbled over it many times.
+
+"By Jove!" he shouted, "give us another cigarette!"
+
+A moment later he was sorry he had asked for it, but he was obliged to
+smoke it.  It brought him such pleasant sensations he decided it would
+be a good medicine to take in crises of hard work.
+
+Immediately after Nelson's difference was found, the boys planned a
+dance.  They had been treated well by the girls of Mt. Alban, and it
+was up to them to reciprocate.
+
+"Don't you think so?" asked the semi-drunk.
+
+"Sure," said Evan, choking on an inhale.
+
+"Who'll start the fund?" asked Bill.
+
+"I will," responded Nelson, producing a five-dollar bill--all he had.
+
+"That's the kind of a sport," said the foreign teller.  "Gee!  I
+haven't seen a real five outside my cage for a month."
+
+"I wish I was on the cash like you, Jack," grinned Watson.
+
+"What would you do?"
+
+"Why, borrow a little occasionally.  You didn't get me wrong, I hope?"
+
+"No chance, Bill; we know you're honest."
+
+The dance given by the bankboys of Mt. Alban was a success--in all but
+a financial way.  The thing did not pay for itself, and there was an
+extra draft on each banker for two dollars.  Even wrote home for a loan
+of five dollars.  He also hinted that he needed a new suit, that he
+felt shabby at parties beside the private banker's son and the
+haberdasher's nephew.  A cheque came signed "George Nelson"; it was
+twenty-five dollars high.  Evan sighed.  Then he slowly folded the
+cheque into his wallet.
+
+He ordered a suit from one of the town tailors and paid ten dollars
+down.
+
+Bill Watson usually wrote the cash book and the cash items.  He saw the
+cheque from Hometon and made mental note of it.  A day or two later he
+asked Evan for a loan to pay the bank guarantee premium, and got five
+dollars.
+
+When his suit was finished Nelson was a few dollars short.  He went on
+the tailor's books.  The same night Julia Watersea called him up and
+asked him down.  He felt obliged to take some candy along.
+
+"How much should I spend for a box of chocolates, Bill?" he asked.
+
+"Nothing less than a buck, kid," replied Bill, almost rendering his
+speech ambiguous.
+
+Evan's salary was still two hundred a year--dollars, not pounds.  The
+box of candy he bought consumed almost two days' earnings.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+_MOVED._
+
+While Evan and Julia ate their candy and put their digestive organs out
+of tune, Frankie Arling sat reading stray poems from her French reader.
+She repeated to herself, in the little nook she called her study, a
+verse of De Musset's:
+
+  "J'ai perdu ma force et ma vie,
+  Et mes amis et ma gaiete;
+  J'ai perdu jusqu'a, la fierte
+  Qui faisait croire a mon genie."
+
+
+That was about how she felt.  She had cried considerably when Our
+Banker first went away.  Now she did not yield to the temptation of
+tears, but she was miserably lonesome and sad--the more so since his
+letters grew less and less frequent and less intimate.
+
+Frankie was a girl of seventeen and as romantic as those young
+creatures are made.  She had always been Evan's "school girl," and he
+had always been her juvenile hero.  Perhaps theirs was the commonest
+form of love-affair, but the character of the affection could never
+rightly be called "common."  Incompatibility makes affection
+commonplace and mean, but Frankie and Evan were suited to each other.
+They both knew they were, and that knowledge made them feel sure of the
+ideals they cherished.
+
+Because she clung to her ideals so tenaciously Frankie was often very
+wretched; she was so on the night of Evan's visit to the Waterseas with
+the box of candy.  Not that she knew about it--but she began to doubt
+the impossibility of such happenings.  His letters had gradually fed a
+suspicion in her mind.
+
+An idea occurred to Frankie.  She would call up Mr. Dunlap, the Hometon
+teller, and invite him up to spend the evening; then she would question
+him concerning the fickleness of bankclerks.
+
+Dunlap answered her telephone call with the words: "Well, Miss Arling,
+I'm working to-night--but I'll gladly postpone work for _you_."  He
+accepted the invitation with alacrity and seemed quite pleased with the
+verandah welcome he received.  Mrs. Arling was out, and he could not
+occupy the parlor alone with the daughter; but still he had reason to
+be thankful.
+
+"How is Evan getting along?" was one of the first questions the
+bankclerk asked.
+
+"Very well, I think," answered Frankie; then, settling immediately to
+business: "Tell me, Mr. Dunlap, is bank work very exciting?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know.  There are some things about it that keep up your
+spirits.  Not so much the bank work itself as the associations."
+
+"What do you mean by 'associations'?"
+
+"Well--when a fellow gets moved, for instance, he meets new--"
+
+"Girls?" suggested Frankie, smiling faintly.
+
+"Yes--like you."
+
+Miss Arling did not recognize the attempt at gallantry.
+
+"I suppose you have been moved pretty often, haven't you, Mr. Dunlap?"
+
+"Six times in four years."
+
+"Have you a girl in every place where you lived?"
+
+"Not exactly," he laughed.  "Of course, I write an odd letter to
+somebody in every one of those towns."
+
+The school-girl had found out what she wanted to know.  If Dunlap had
+come to visit her with any idea that she had forgotten her
+school-"fellow," Nelson, he could not have cherished the illusion long,
+for she seemed to lose interest in everything, all very suddenly, and
+when he suggested that he probably ought to go back and balance the
+ledger-keeper's books she encouraged him in so generous an undertaking.
+A man with six girls knows when he is wanted.
+
+Frankie went in to her piano and played "Sleep and Forget."  That was a
+strange selection for a young school-girl to choose; but young girls
+are born dramatists.  Darkness had fallen and the stars were beginning
+to peep.  She was on the verandah again, looking at the evening sky,
+wondering why people left home and loved ones for the other things,
+wealth, fame, pleasure, change.  The night had sadness in its
+countenance--which it reflected to the girl's.  She was quite like a
+summer's evening.  She should have been, perhaps, more like a summer
+morning.
+
+While the Hometon girl stood on her father's verandah, gazing and
+philosophizing, Evan stood on the Watersea verandah at Mt. Alban,
+gazing also, but not reflecting.  He was looking into the eyes of
+Julia, rather steadily for a lad of less than eighteen, and talking.
+
+"Mighty good of you to take in a stranger like me," he was saying.
+
+"My dear boy" (Julia was past nineteen), "we just love to have your
+company.  Come any time you can."
+
+He had a sudden impulse to take her hand, but she seemed to detect it,
+and subdued him with a powerful smile.
+
+"Miss Wat--"
+
+"Call me 'Julia,' won't you?"
+
+"All right, I will."  (But he didn't.)  "I think you are a good sport."
+
+"Oh, Mr.--"
+
+"Call me 'Evan,' will you?"
+
+"What a nice name," she smiled; "it's odd.  All right, Evan, but you
+mustn't call me a 'sport.'"
+
+He had thought it was going to be considerable of a compliment.
+
+"You know what I mean, Miss--Julia!"
+
+"Oh, don't call me 'Miss Julia,'" she laughed; "that sounds like a
+maiden aunt."
+
+He colored; his breaks were coming too thickly.
+
+They wandered down the lawn-walk to the gate, and there Nelson bade her
+good-night by shaking hands.  He knew she would be in the bank next
+day, but handshakes are always in order after nine o'clock p.m.
+
+As he walked along Mt. Alban's quietest and prettiest street toward the
+bank a peculiar sense of loneliness and guilt possessed him.  He
+suggested to himself that he only regarded Julia as a friend, and that
+knowing people like the Waterseas was necessary to his success as a
+banker.  Of course he intended to pay his way along; he would always
+give Julia candy and take her out, in return for her kindness to him.
+The thought that he might be involving her in one of those attachments
+more easily made than broken did not enter Evan's head.  He was too
+inexperienced to worry over such matters.  Others were too experienced.
+
+Telepathic waves reached him from Hometon.  He saw Frankie's face
+clearly outlined inside the Little Dipper.  He remembered his words to
+her, words containing a promise.  Yes, indeed, he would be true--
+
+But still he felt the warmth of Julia's hand.  Why had he taken it in
+his, and why had he felt buoyant when she blushed?
+
+He was vaguely conscious of a conflict in his heart.  Yet he swore to
+himself that everything would be all right.  Young men are usually
+quite sure that nothing unpleasant can come of anything.
+
+Bill Watson was sitting in the manager's office when Evan entered.  He
+greeted the savings man with a puff of smoke followed by no words.
+
+"Something new for you to be in so early, Bill," said Evan.
+
+Bill opened his mouth in the shape of a cave, and kept the white smoke
+revolving within it--like some sort of mysterious and legendary white
+fleece.
+
+"How did she like the chocolates?" he said suddenly.
+
+"They seemed to go all right."
+
+Bill puffed a while.
+
+"Shame to blow good coin like that," he said, musingly.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Well, when a fellow thinks of the blots he makes earning a bean he
+should be gentle with it."
+
+Nelson laughed derisively.
+
+"You're not getting economical, are you, Bill?"
+
+"No, but, I'm sore on myself to-night.  About once a month I take a
+night off to repent."
+
+Evan pinched his pal's knee-cap.
+
+"A fellow can't be a piker, Bill," he said, with the air of a
+profligate young millionaire escapading in the columns of the press.
+"You can't go to parties and things without spending money."
+
+Watson looked at his desk-mate.
+
+"Evan," he said, thoughtfully, "in about two years more you'll be just
+where I am."
+
+"Where's that?"
+
+"In debt, and a spendthrift--if you can call me a spendthrift for
+getting away with $400 a year."
+
+Nelson sighed.  It was unusual for Watson to turn monitor.  What he
+said was all the more effective on that account.
+
+The Hometon boy thought of his tailor's account.  He would have to be
+writing home for more money before long--unless he could borrow it.
+The very caution Bill had sounded suggested to Nelson a way out.  He
+would borrow from a stranger.  He could pay his father back the cheque,
+and also he could settle the tailor's bill.  Just how he would settle
+the real debt itself was not for present consideration.  It never is.
+It is the humanest thing in the world to borrow money.
+
+Evan turned the light on his desk and wrote a letter to his father.  It
+thanked the merchant for his loan, in rather a businesslike manner, and
+assured him he would get the money back.  This was the letter of an
+ostensibly self-made son to his merchant father, reversing the title of
+a well-known story.
+
+Another letter Evan wrote--to Frankie Arling.  This one was as follows:
+
+
+"Dear Frank,--It is quite a while since I wrote you.  I hope you have
+not been accusing me of negligence.  I am pretty busy, you know.
+
+"The people up here are mighty kind to us bank-fellows.  There is one
+family in particular that uses us white.  Miss Watersea--that is the
+daughter--told me last night I was to come up as often as I could.
+They have a magnificent home.  I wish I were making more money so that
+I could take Julia (that's her name) out more.
+
+"How are you getting along at school?  It's surprising how soon a
+person forgets those lessons you are now learning.  Bill is calling
+me--I must close for this time.
+
+"Yours, as before,
+  "EVAN."
+
+
+If he had known the comments Frankie would make on a conspicuous
+sentence of one of his paragraphs, Evan would have made the letter
+still shorter than it was.  It was natural that he should refer to
+Julia.  One should never write a letter to anyone when someone else is
+on his mind, unless the third party is a mutual friend.  Letters, like
+young children just able to talk, have a habit of telling tales.  Often
+we say to a sheet of paper what we would scarcely tell by word of mouth
+to the one to whom it is addressed; and yet the letter is mailed and
+forgotten with the profoundest nonchalance.
+
+The following day a long envelope came from head office to the Mt.
+Alban office.  It contained the "increases."
+
+Castle's salary was raised from $650 to $800.  Watson got $100; Evan a
+raise of $50.  The junior did not expect any, and he was not
+disappointed in his expectations.  Nevertheless he was disappointed.
+
+Mr. Robb was snubbed!  He said nothing.  Bill emulated the manager's
+stoicism--another two dollars per week made little difference to Bill;
+it would all have to go out in debts, anyway.
+
+Castle "took" his increase with dignity, making no comments and voicing
+no rapture.  Bill watched him from his ledger.
+
+"Say, Alf," he said at last, under a growing deviltry, "you seem to be
+a favorite.  Now I don't think you're worth eight hundred dollars a
+year--honestly, do you?"
+
+The teller's delicate skin became pink.
+
+"I don't blame you for being sore, Watson," he retorted, gingerly for
+him, "when head office shows discrimination; it hurts, I suppose."
+
+Watson grinned.  He rarely lost his temper.  He sighed comically.
+
+"I can't help if my name isn't Castle," he said, coolly.
+
+The teller opened the door of his cage and rushed into the manager's
+room.
+
+"Mr. Robb," he cried, in his tenor tones, "I'm not going to stand for
+the insults of Watson any longer."
+
+"What's the matter now?" asked Robb, not encouragingly.
+
+"Watson's talking of favoritism and that sort of rot.  He knows I earn
+all I get from head office."
+
+"That's right enough, Alf," said Robb, calmly.  "You earn what you get,
+but you also get what you earn.  The rest of us don't."
+
+The teller was dumfounded.  The way the manager spoke would have halted
+him even had he considered the words unjust--which he could not.  But
+Castle's sense of dignity was too great to endure argument at that
+moment; he flushed with humiliation and withdrew unceremoniously from
+Robb's office.
+
+Robb would not give his teller the satisfaction of calling Watson on
+the carpet, but when Castle had quit work for the day, the manager
+accosted Bill.
+
+"Were you rubbing it into Alf to-day?" he asked, leaning against the
+ledger desk.
+
+"Just a little," said Bill, smiling.
+
+"You want to go easy, Watson.  Some day Alf will be an inspector or
+something, and then he'll remember thee."
+
+Bill looked up from his work quickly.
+
+"Surely we don't have to curry the favor of a brat like that!"  Then,
+in a moment, "His preaching against me to-day didn't seem to get him in
+very strong with the manager, Mr. Robb?"
+
+Robb made a face.
+
+"Oh, I don't pay much attention to him.  Sometimes I feel sorry for
+him, and then again I can't help despising him.  He's got bank
+aristocracy in him, and that makes it hard for him among us common
+fellows.  I think I insulted him this afternoon--"
+
+Bill interrupted with:
+
+"Wouldn't be surprised if he squealed it to the Big Eye."
+
+The boys called Inspector I. Castle the "Big Eye," because of his
+initial and of his facility for seeing things; also for other reasons.
+
+"Oh, no," said the manager, sceptically, "I don't think he's that much
+of a cad."
+
+"Well, you know, Mr. Robb, he'd soothe his poor little conscience with
+the thought that it is a fellow's duty to report any treason against
+head office.  That's the policy the bank itself pursues.  Why should
+Castle have any more honor than he is taught to have?"
+
+Evan pretended to be busy, but he was listening.
+
+Mr. Robb laughed.
+
+"I'm ashamed of you, Watson," he said, and still smiling, walked away.
+Once inside his office, however, his face straightened and he looked
+steadily at a corner of the ceiling.
+
+When Castle left the bank, about four-thirty, he walked soberly up town
+to the Coign Hotel and ascended to his room.  It was a nice room for
+the teller of a town bank to occupy, boasting a wicker chair, a leather
+couch and a brass bed.  A couple of rather pretentious pictures hung on
+the walls, otherwise decorated with pennants.  The pennants were all
+Alfred knew about colleges.  A desk filled one corner of the room, and
+there was the atmosphere of an office over all.  The wonder is that Alf
+didn't have his bed encaged.
+
+To his desk the nifty bankman turned his eyes.  After washing his hands
+and adjusting his tie, he sat down to write.
+
+Twenty-four hours after the letter he had written was mailed Inspector
+I. Castle received one addressed in his nephew's handwriting.
+
+Before a week had passed Sam Robb enjoyed the privilege of reading a
+circular.  It dealt with loyalty to the bank.  One paragraph read as
+follows:
+
+"We wish to warn the managers and staff against the common tendency to
+ridicule bank customs and establishments.  Some of our employes have
+gone so far as to criticize head office indiscriminately in the matter
+of salaries, etc.  We think it only fair that instances of disaffection
+should be reported to us, so that we may ascertain who is and who is
+not loyal to the bank, and reward accordingly."
+
+The circular did not say "punish accordingly."  That would not have
+been diplomatic.
+
+Robb's face grew white--not with fear.  All day he was silent, although
+it could not be said that he was irritable.  He seemed uninterested in
+business and quiet--merely that.
+
+Evan found him sitting moodily in his office late that evening.  The
+savings man had been proving up his ledger.  He did not greet the
+manager; he was going to pass on in silence when he heard his name
+spoken from the armchair.
+
+"Yes, sir."  He turned toward Mr. Robb.
+
+"Are you in a hurry?"  There was no sarcasm in the tone.
+
+Evan sat down.
+
+"No, sir; my time isn't worth much, I guess."
+
+The manager looked at him analytically.
+
+"You're beginning to realize it, are you?"
+
+Nelson explained that he meant nothing by the remark, and Robb grunted
+discontentedly.
+
+"I want you to see the circular we got to-day, Evan.  Here, read that
+and tell me what you think of it."
+
+While the young man read, the man of forty, the bachelor banker,
+waited.  Robb was a lonesome man.  He should have had a son almost as
+old as Evan, but he had none--and Evan would have to answer.  It was
+somewhat comforting to have a confidant like him.
+
+"Looks as if Castle did write, after all," said Evan, suddenly.
+
+The manager smiled grimly.
+
+"You've guessed it, I think," he said.  "How would you like the current
+ledger, Evan?"
+
+"Fine!"
+
+It never took Evan long to decide anything when his success was at
+stake.  He had unlimited faith in promotions and quite a strong
+confidence in his own powers.  The clerical quirks of banking were day
+by day disappearing before his persistent faculties, and he was always
+ready to take on new work for the sake of experience.
+
+"Well," continued the manager, "I'm going to suggest to head office
+that Alf is drawing too big a salary for this branch to support.  It
+may get me in bad, but after all is said and done I'm manager here, and
+deserve a little say.  If they move him the staff will be raised one
+notch all round.  Watson ought to make a capital teller, and--I like
+him."
+
+Before long the Mt. Alban manager wrote about the matter, without
+consulting his teller.  The reply he got from head office read:
+
+
+"Please instruct Mr. Evan Nelson to report at once to Creek Bend,
+Ontario.  By taking on a new junior you can cut down expenses and still
+keep your present teller.
+
+"(Signed) I. CASTLE."
+
+
+When Bill Watson saw the inspector's instructions he cursed volubly
+behind his ledger and exclaimed:
+
+"That settles it; me for a move, too."
+
+Mr. Robb called him on the carpet.
+
+"Watson," he said, "you have a nice job in this office.  I heard you
+talking to Nelson a while ago about a move.  Now if you shift from here
+it won't help your salary any, and it may involve you in a bunch of
+work.  Besides, you have a free room here."
+
+Bill thought a while.
+
+"I guess that's a fact," he said finally.  "I won't say anything.  I
+guess you and I can hold the fort against Mr. Alfred Castle, eh?"
+
+The manager laughed and extended his hand.
+
+"Bill," he said (usually he called the ledger-keeper "Watson"), "I'm in
+wrong already, and if you asked to leave, head office might think there
+was something wrong with my management."
+
+"I get you," said Bill, unconsciously speaking as he would to a pal.
+"By the way, do you suppose the Big Eye knows that Alf has a girl here?"
+
+"Sure--likely," said Robb; "I'm now convinced that that boy chirrups to
+his dear uncle about everything."
+
+After musing a bit Bill observed:
+
+"I wish I could make him blow on me.  No, I don't, either--he hasn't
+got the physique to stand it."
+
+Robb chuckled.  They spoke of Nelson.
+
+"He's a good scout," said Bill.  "How is it they always move the decent
+heads away?"
+
+"I give them up," said the manager; "the older I grow the more head
+office puzzles me."
+
+Nelson rapped at the door and was invited in.  "Well," grinned the
+manager, "our pipe-dream didn't mature, did it?"
+
+But Evan was having one of his own, and while he did not like to leave
+so kind a manager as Robb, he was thinking almost entirely of himself.
+
+"I'll probably be teller in Creek Bend, won't I?"
+
+"Yes," said Bill, "if there's anything to be 'told.'"
+
+The manager laughed quietly.
+
+"Take care you don't get lazy, Evan," he said.  "They won't leave you
+there forever.  It will be a city office for yours in due course, and
+then you'll need to be in practice.  You'll be sure to hit a bees'-nest
+before you quit the bank."
+
+"If they always use me right," said Evan, "I won't ever quit."
+
+"Well," yawned Watson, "if you're satisfied, Nelsy, I guess they are."
+
+Nelson waited a minute before making the request he came with the
+intention of making.
+
+"Mr. Robb," he asked, "could I take a day off to run home and see the
+folks?  Creek Bend is a hundred miles away and hard to get at--so the
+station agent says."
+
+"Sure," said the manager, "but I'll have to 'fix' the head office
+travel-slip."
+
+"What's that?" asked Evan.
+
+Mr. Robb showed him a slip of paper to be signed by the manager of the
+branch left and the branch arrived at, also by the transient clerk.
+This slip records the time to a minute and allows no stop-over or
+visits en route.  Neither does it permit of delay in leaving.
+
+Evan suddenly decided he would not bother going home.  He explained to
+Watson later that he considered it crooked to tamper with the
+travel-slip and thought he would be a cad to let the manager run the
+chance of further incurring head office displeasure by altering it.
+
+"By heck," said Bill, "you've got to let some of that good conscience
+run out if you ever expect to stay in the bank."
+
+"Well, Bill," was the reply, "when I find that I can't be honest in the
+bank I'll get out of it."
+
+Watson remembered that remark years afterwards.
+
+Evan wrote letters home, one to his mother and one to Frankie Arling.
+Then he packed his trunk and bade good-bye to Mt. Alban.  Within four
+hours after receiving notice from head office he was on the train bound
+for Creek Bend.
+
+Mrs. Nelson cried over her son's letter, and went to her husband for
+consolation.
+
+"Carrie," he said, "it will do the boy good."
+
+"But why didn't they let him say good-bye to us?" she cried.
+
+"Well," answered George Nelson, "business is business, you know."
+
+In his store-office the father used profanity.  Men swear.  He voiced a
+wish that all banks were made of sand and situated in the neighborhood
+of Newfoundland.
+
+Frankie swallowed something in her throat as she read her letter.
+There was one grain of comfort in it, though, prompting the utterance:
+
+"That ends Julia!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+_THE VILLAGE MAIDEN._
+
+Months had passed.  Western Ontario was turning brown; heaps of leaves
+had already fallen.  The village of Creek Bend was sleeping through the
+Indian Summer day.  So was Evan Nelson--he lay sprawled on a hammock
+swung between two apple-trees behind the bank.
+
+It is not to be inferred, however, that Evan was lazy, or that he had
+spent the summer lazily.  Every morning before seven he had been out
+for a three-mile run, and every evening it had been football with the
+village team or a ride on the bicycle.  He knew that physical exercise
+was necessary to health, and he took it as regularly as his mother used
+to make him take a spring tonic.
+
+The work of the Creek Bend branch was ludicrously light.  The manager
+was not a real one--he signed "acting."  The branch had been opened for
+the sole purpose of keeping another bank out.  Evan signed
+"pro-accountant."  The first time he decorated a money order after that
+fashion a thrill made itself felt along his spine and in his hair.
+
+Nelson's duties at first consisted of doing what little ledger work
+there was to do, writing settlement drafts and so forth, and attending
+to the mail.  By degrees the manager, E. T. Dunn, initiated him into
+other work, until at last he did practically everything, even to the
+writing of returns.
+
+As he sprawled now in the hammock between the apple-trees he gradually
+became conscious and his mind resumed the thread of thought sleep had
+broken off.  He thought, with his eyes shut, about clerical work.
+Mentally he took a deposit from a customer, entered it in his
+"blotter," wrote it in the supplementary, and posted it in a ledger; it
+was included in the cash-book total, and from there found its way to
+the general ledger.  So it was with every entry, credit or debit.
+"Returns" were merely copies of general-ledger balances, or parts
+thereof.  Evan saw his way from beginning to end of the routine, and
+wondered that anything so simple as bank work could ever worry a man.
+He recalled the first week of his clerkship in Mt. Alban, and a grin
+crept over his somnolent features.
+
+But Evan was not only musing--he was thinking.  He knew the banking
+system was uniform throughout; and until he should be manager, he saw
+himself spending years working out some part of the routine now so
+simple to him.  Mr. Dunn had worked at head office, and he told Nelson
+that there were clerks down there who did nothing from morning till
+night but add.  Others there were who spent every hour of the day
+"checking" branch figures.  What an existence! he thought; what a
+brainless life!  Human automatons!
+
+Thinking in these channels made Evan dissatisfied, and sometimes he
+offered pointed observations to the acting-manager.  Dunn would smile
+and agree with anything that was said--but invariably settled down to
+his pipe and paper again, contented to let the business take care of
+him as it would.  Dunn was one of a large class, in the bank, who are
+satisfied with six cigars a day, a bed each night, and seventy-five
+dollars a month.
+
+The exercise Evan had accustomed himself to gave him increased
+vitality, and there being neither work nor social life enough in Creek
+Bend to satisfy this new vim he fell into the habit of reading and
+studying considerably.  Dunn frequently expressed his surprise at
+seeing a bankclerk labor so, but the junior officer paid no attention,
+since the senior raised no objection.  Evan gave his mind an excursion
+every day into the large world beyond him; the further he travelled the
+more ridiculous his present occupation seemed.  But he encouraged
+reaction from these fits of treason and in the end criticized his own
+imagination more than those things, which, like the bank, are generally
+recognized to be tangibly great.
+
+A book lay beneath the hammock this dreamy Autumn afternoon.  It was
+"The Strenuous Life," by Roosevelt.  One would have thought the
+reclining figure had grown weary of ambition and had cast the incentive
+from him.  An Indian Summer day is not conducive to aspirations: mellow
+late-Autumn is more tolerant of beauty and love.
+
+A flesh-and-blood combination of both came upon Evan unawares.
+
+"Wow!" he shouted, rubbing the top of his head.
+
+The girl laughed until she was ashamed of herself; then hid her face
+and started to run off.
+
+"Don't go 'way, Lily," he called; "I want to say something to you."
+
+She stopped, and eyed him suspiciously.
+
+"What is it, Mr. Nelson?"
+
+"Come here and I'll tell you."
+
+She ventured near.
+
+"Won't you stay a while?" he said, turning his eyes on hers.  "I can't
+empty it all out in a minute, you know."
+
+"Is it important?" asked Lily, slyly.
+
+"Sure," he laughed; "I wouldn't waste your valuable time if it weren't."
+
+She pouted.
+
+"You think I have nothing to do, I suppose, Mr. Nelson!"
+
+Evan was Mr. to her chiefly because he was a bankclerk.
+
+"Oh no, not that.  But you don't seem to be cut out for a post-office
+ornament.  Do you ever feel dissatisfied here?"
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I was just wondering--I'm beginning to get sick of it myself."
+
+She laughed.
+
+"So am I," she said; "and it's my home, too."
+
+She had settled down on the grass, and her eyes were on a level with
+the bankclerk's.
+
+"Still you'll likely settle down here and get married at last," said
+Evan, soberly.
+
+"No chance,"--haughtily.  "Do you think I would have one of these dubs
+around here?"
+
+"What's the matter with them?"
+
+"Oh, they're slow.  When I get married I'm going to have a smart,
+up-to-date fellow."
+
+Evan had a smile ready for her when she looked at him.  She colored
+radiantly.
+
+"I must go," she said, rising, and skipped away, not to be stopped this
+time.
+
+A few minutes later the acting-manager came out with a highly
+illustrated magazine.
+
+"Say, Bo," he yawned, "things are getting pretty thick.  You can't do
+much on that $250, you know."
+
+Evan laughed.
+
+"A bank fellow's not in much danger," he said.
+
+"No," replied Dunn, "but what about the girl?"
+
+Nelson revolved the remark in his mind a while.  He decided he would
+not be so friendly with Lily from that time on.
+
+"It's funny," observed Dunn, again, "how village girls fall for a
+bankclerk--when we are made of the very stuff their own brothers are
+made of.  Most of us came from a farm or a village.  The bank has
+fitted us out with a shine and a shave, also has made us more useless
+year after year, and when we degenerate sufficiently the girls begin to
+adore us.  I used to correspond with ten girls in different towns,
+regularly."
+
+A strange feature of banking life, and which goes to emphasize the
+peculiar fascination of it, is that every man knows he is degenerating
+and understands why, but he seldom does anything about it.  He sails
+carelessly along with Ulysses' crew, enjoying the voyage as much as
+possible, and worrying not about a landing.
+
+"Still you wouldn't be anything but a banker, would you?" asked Nelson.
+
+"I couldn't if I would," said Dunn, lazily; "I've been at it eight
+years.  That's all I know."
+
+"Well, supposing you were back on my salary, do you think you would
+stay in the bank?"
+
+"I suppose so," answered the other; "I was on $250 once, and I didn't
+quit."
+
+Dunn's indifferent contentment had considerable influence over Nelson.
+It caused the junior man to severely criticize his own restlessness.
+One of the acting-manager's slogans was about the rolling stone and the
+moss.  The effect of that obsolete aphorism on moss-backs is pitiful.
+It impressed Evan, not because of his mossiness altogether, but because
+of his youth, and of youth's anxiety to make good.  The lad of eighteen
+had an example of banking in his manager, Dunn, but his eyes were not
+yet opened.  He could see the $75 a month very plainly, but he could
+not comprehend the eight long years of service that had made Dunn's
+salary what it was--and that had made him the laggard he was.  Dunn had
+not entirely lost ambition, any more than a hundred Dunns in every bank
+to-day have lost it; but eight years' specialty service makes a young
+man useless for anything else but his specialty, and when he does
+muster enough strength to sit up in the bed he has made, he sinks back
+on the pillow again, exhausted, because of the weight on his chest.
+
+But Dunn's predicament was, chiefly, Dunn's lookout--and, to some
+extent, the lookout of tradition-bound relatives.  Had he been an
+exceptional man his attitude toward the business would have been
+different, and Evan, in the beginning of his awakening, would probably
+have benefited by contact with him.  As it was, Evan scolded his
+complaining brain and forced it back into bed, as a mother does her
+baby; in fact, it is to be feared he gave it a dose of soothing-syrup,
+too.
+
+The Hometon boy actually saved a little on his five dollars per week.
+The manager frequently borrowed a dollar or two from him.  But Evan had
+not yet paid back the money his father had given him--George Nelson
+warned him not to try.
+
+"Keep it, my boy," he wrote, "and start an account.  Try and put away a
+certain amount each week."  This sentence was stroked out, vetoed by
+saner afterthought.  The father doubtless realized the absurdity of
+asking a young man away from home earning five dollars a week to save.
+"Keep yourself if possible," said the letter, "on the salary you draw;
+but if you run shy I am always ready to help you out."  Evan thought of
+his tailor's bill, and decided to pay it before settling with his
+father.
+
+Among the great economists at the head of the Canadian banking business
+there are some who seem to make a specialty of the following sermon to
+employes: "It matters not what you make, you can always save
+something."  Sure!  You can steer clear of a young lady on the street
+in case you might have to buy her an ice-cream, and you can always
+raise a headache on garden-party or picnic nights.  The class of
+economists mentioned seem unable to realize that a man, young or old,
+is worth his salt, if he works honestly, whether he be a sewer-digger
+or a clerk who spends half his income on laundry.
+
+Sometimes not only dissatisfaction but resentment took possession of
+Nelson.  He was, in the first place, obliged to go where the bank sent
+him; and in the second place, to take what the bank gave him.  He would
+receive a certain increase yearly, no matter where or what he was in
+the business--and the Bonehead (wherever he was) would get the same or
+better.  Discrimination according to ability was unknown in
+banking--except on reports: and there it was a joke to every man in the
+service.
+
+But youth is very pliant.  Employers of young men are familiar with the
+fact.  Something always came along to quiet Evan's mind before he had
+gone so far as to write an "indiscreet" letter to head office.  What a
+grand thing it is to be discreet!  Why was mention of this attribute,
+discretion, omitted from the Apostle's list?  What anxiety and sorrow
+possession of this virtue would save us--and what enlightenment! ....
+Had Evan written an impulsive letter to head office he would have been
+ousted from the bank; he would very likely have been metaphorically
+kicked out.  The kick would have hurt for a while, but not like the
+sting that must burn later on.  Yet, how was he to foresee that which
+was coming?  He might have estimated his chances by the experience of
+others; but boys, like young nations, do not suffer themselves to be
+guided in that way.
+
+The excitement of saving money, as much as anything, now held Evan to
+his desk.  He was putting away a dollar weekly.  By Thanksgiving he
+would be able to take a trip home, and incidentally make his mother a
+present of the turkey for dinner.  If the gobbler Evan plotted against
+could only have known how safe his neck was he would have put all the
+roosters in the barnyard out of business, and whetted his bill for the
+drake.  A calamity was destined to befall the young Creek Bend teller;
+yet, viewed from the standpoint of its frequency in the business, this
+"calamity" deserved only the name of a "professional accident"--for
+which there is no provision made in the Rules and Regulations.  It
+happened in this wise:
+
+A black-whiskered man came in, accompanied by the village hotel-keeper,
+with a cheque to be cashed.  It was "marked good" by a bank in London,
+Ontario.  Evan paid it without showing it to the manager.  Dunn saw it
+afterwards and let it pass for seventy dollars, the amount the customer
+received.  The figures were a compromise between $20 and $70, but the
+"body" of the cheque (what a teller goes by) looked very much like
+Seventy.  Evan thought no more about the strange-looking customer whom
+the hotel-keeper had identified, until the cheque came back from
+London, with the following memo: "This was marked for Twenty Dollars
+only."
+
+The teller rushed out to the hotel and asked about the man of beard.
+The hotel-keeper said he only knew him as an occasional drinker; and
+because the hotel-keeper had not endorsed the cheque and needed no loan
+from the bank, he waxed impolite.  Evan gathered that the shark had
+left town and would not be back.
+
+Dunn, although he had not had the matter referred to him, felt sorry
+for Nelson and comforted him with the offer to pay half.
+
+"I would have cashed it myself for seventy," he said.
+
+Evan was in the depths.
+
+"Do you think head office would let us debit it to charges?" he asked
+hopelessly.
+
+The manager looked at him in dismay.
+
+"My dear boy," he smiled, "they would almost fire you for suggesting
+such a thing.  I tried that once and they wrote back telling me to be
+more careful, and insinuating that no good clerk need lose money on the
+cash.  Never look to them for sympathy, because you won't get it."
+
+Nelson swallowed a lump and drew a cheque on his account for all he
+had--$22.  He thought it very decent of Dunn to make up half the
+shortage--and it was.  The acting-manager was a good sport--too good
+for his own good.  Evan figured that the Mt. Alban tailor would have to
+wait.
+
+Mrs. Nelson was advised by letter that "seeing there are only two of us
+running this branch, and the manager wants to go to Toronto for the
+holiday, we have decided that I must stay.  I'm very sorry, mother--but
+it won't be long till Christmas."
+
+There was truth in the manager's wanting to go away for the holiday:
+Evan encouraged him in the desire, because he wanted to express
+appreciation of Dunn's kindness in putting up $25 of the loss.
+
+The manager left his "combination" in an envelope in case he should
+miss a train back, and Evan was entrusted with several thousand dollars
+in cash.  Dunn left at noon Saturday and would be gone until ten
+o'clock Monday morning.
+
+"Don't run off with the safe," he laughed as he said good-bye.
+
+"No, I'll only take the contents," answered Evan, cheerily.
+
+But he felt not the least bit cheery.  He thought of the last
+Thanksgiving spent in Hometon, of mother, sister and Frankie--and the
+dinner.  It must be confessed that, in his memory, the dinner shared
+with Frankie.
+
+If Evan had been crooked, instead of turkey-dressing and home-scenes he
+would have been thinking of the money within his grasp.  As it was, the
+filthy lucre never entered his head.  He did think of the double
+responsibility, and it made him proud; but that was the extent of his
+money speculations.
+
+While he sat in the acting-manager's chair dreaming of home and
+wondering why he had not written Frankie a letter this week, a gentle
+tap came to the front door of the bank, which was always locked at noon
+on Saturdays.  Evan peeked out to ascertain whether or not it was a
+customer who could be avoided.  A bright eye met the bare spot in the
+frosted glass he was utilizing, and with a laugh he opened the door.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," said Lily, blushing; "I beg your pardon, but could you
+let me have a little mucilage?"
+
+"Sure," he said; "come in.  We'll have to shut the door or some gink
+will be coming along for a loan."
+
+Lily hesitated a moment, but seeing no way out finally entered.  Evan
+went behind his desk to get the mucilage.  While he was rummaging there
+another rap came to the door, and Lily peered out.
+
+"It's a farmer," she whispered, running back to where Evan was.
+
+"Don't let him know we're here then," said the clerk; "I can't open up
+for him."
+
+The disappointed customer hung around, hoping, no doubt, to be humored,
+as he had often been.  Nelson and the young girl from the post-office
+stood behind a high desk waiting for the intruder to leave.
+
+"Just think," whispered Lily, "what the gossips of this town would say
+if they knew--"
+
+"They won't know," said Evan, reassuringly.
+
+"It would hurt your business, Mr. Nelson, wouldn't it?"
+
+The sweet face was turned up to him.  There was the confidence of
+innocence in her eyes.  Fate had denied the lonely bankclerk a trip
+home, but it had placed a pair of baby lips within easy reach.  He
+gazed, flushed--and kissed Lily.  She trembled and the tears came into
+her blue eyes.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Nelson!" she cried, crimson with excitement and pleasure.
+
+He drew away, feeling ashamed and guilty.  His embarrassment was
+ten-fold greater than the girl's: she was acting consistently with her
+childish fancies of the past few months, while Evan was betraying a
+girl in Hometon.
+
+Beginning to realize the futility of waiting at the bank door, the
+farmer dragged himself away, muttering anathemas on high collars and
+patent locks.
+
+"Here's your mucilage," said Evan, handing Lily a small bottle.  "Don't
+get it on your clothes."
+
+He uttered the last sentence for want of something to say.
+
+"You must think I'm a regular baby," she replied, with a touch of
+scorn.  When a young girl has just been kissed by a young man she wants
+him to understand she is a woman, full-grown.
+
+Evan laughed and said she was anything but a baby.
+
+That afternoon a letter arrived, by stage mail, from Frankie Arling.
+It was another of her school compositions.
+
+
+"Dear Evan: Your letter just came, telling us you can't get off for
+Thanksgiving.  I think it is real mean of your manager to treat you
+like that.  I don't think the bank is fair with its clerks at all.
+
+"Now, there's a young fellow here (an awfully clever and nice chap) who
+counted on getting down to the city, but he was out in his books, so
+the manager couldn't let him off.  His name is Reade: we are going to
+have him up to the house for tea.  Father likes him, and so do all of
+us.
+
+"I'm going to a dance to-night; that is why I am sending this letter
+away in such a hurry.  You don't deserve a very long one, though, do
+you?  Hoping you spend a decent Thanksgiving, and wishing you success.
+
+Yours sincerely,
+  "FRANK."
+
+
+"Success be darned!" mumbled Evan.  The smile with which he had begun
+the letter had died down to an emaciated grin and finally evaporated
+between compressed lips.  "I hope Reade enjoys himself!"
+
+He went to the telephone and rang up two longs and three shorts--the
+post-office.  Had he reread Frankie's letter and sat down to analyze it
+and to think, he probably would not have telephoned; but when a fellow
+has lost a summer's savings and a Thanksgiving dinner all at once, it
+is, perhaps, natural that he should feel uncertain even of his
+sweet-heart, and act accordingly.
+
+"Hello," said Evan; "is that you, Lily?"
+
+"Yes, this is me!"
+
+"How would you like to go for a drive?  You would?  All right, I'll
+call for you after supper."
+
+Evan rented a livery, and Lily's folk raising no objection, the young
+girl went out to advertise the fact that she had a banker beau.  All
+the town wondered.
+
+It is easy to condemn Evan for his flirtations with Julia Watersea and
+Lily Allen.  If he had stayed at school, matters would have been
+different.  When the mind is wading through study it turns readily to
+pleasure, but does not dwell upon it.  In the simple routine of the
+bank, in spite of the books he read, Evan found his mind drifting to
+excitement of some sort continually.  When he brought it up, there was
+nothing for it to settle upon.  When he left Mt. Alban he was being
+gradually drawn into what was called the "social life"--a life that
+would make him an ideal bankclerk, but nothing bigger.  Now, after a
+few months of ease, he found himself craving the whirl again; and he
+must seize any small pleasure at hand.
+
+So he seized Lily Allen around the waist and acted sentimentally.
+
+"You mustn't," she murmured, making no effort to release herself.
+
+"I must," said he.  That was the way he felt.
+
+When winter had come Evan had saved enough to take him home for
+Christmas.  He was very careful with strangers, especially when they
+wore whiskers.  He knew everybody in Creek Bend; especially did he know
+the Allens.  After that night of the drive he and Lily had spent many
+an hour together.  The result of it was that he let his correspondence
+with Frankie fall off, soothing his conscience with Reade.
+Occasionally he sent a picture-postal to Julia Watersea, too, and when
+it was answered in like manner he always felt better.
+
+Christmas was nearing now.  The snow stayed, to prepare the roads for
+Santa's outfit.  The two stores of Creek Bend had decorated their
+fronts with tissue-paper and pressed raisins, and the post-office
+emitted holly stickers.
+
+A village post-office is always interesting.  That of Creek Bend
+interested Evan, not because of curious loiterers--themselves
+curiosities--but principally on account of its fair clerk.  He admitted
+as much to himself.  The village had him married to Lily, and he began
+to wonder if she really hadn't points over Frankie.
+
+"Another of those bank letters you all look for so anxiously, Evan,"
+she smiled, handing him an envelope from the Inspector's Department.
+
+A few minutes later he called in the post-office again and beckoned
+Lily to the money-order wicket.
+
+"I'm moved!" he whispered, excitedly.
+
+Tears came into the young girl's eyes.  Evan brushed them away that
+night with his handkerchief, but they would come again.
+
+"I'll not forget you, Lily," he whispered.
+
+And he never would forget her.  In moments of introspection, in times
+of deepest thought, all his life through, he would remember her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+_A BANK HOLIDAY._
+
+Christmas had come--again.  A year had gone by.
+
+Evan Nelson was preparing to go home for a two days' visit.
+
+"Here, Henty," he said, "put your finger on this money parcel while I
+tie it."
+
+The junior at Banfield branch had a large finger, just the sort for
+holding down a thong, although it guided a pen badly.  He was a big,
+red-faced, shaggy-haired fellow, born to the physical strain of a
+practical agriculturalist.
+
+"Henty," said the teller, as he waxed the money parcel, "how did you
+ever get into the bank?"
+
+"Why?" grinned the junior.
+
+"Oh, I don't know.  You're too strong or too something for this
+business.  If I had your frame I'd go into the ring."
+
+"This is ring enough for me," said Henty.  "I can have a round here any
+time--with the cash book and savings."
+
+The ledger keeper spoke up.  (Henty's initials were A. P.)
+
+"Say, Ape--I'll bet you lose more good sweat making out a settlement
+draft than you would covering a pig-pen with old tin."
+
+"Aw, forget it," said A. P., smiling good-naturedly; "the bank has
+worse dubs than me.  I mean than I.  Take yourself for example----"
+
+"Impossible," replied Filter, the ledger keeper.
+
+Gordon Filter was tall, lean and pale.  He was a sedentary person and
+loved meddling with figures.  He swore continually about his salary and
+blasphemed against the bank, but his work was always perfect and he was
+always watching over it with pride.  Filter was what was known as a
+"fusser."  He worked slowly, mechanically, and without originality, but
+he made few mistakes.  He was a good clerk--that was about the best he
+would ever be.
+
+There was the strongest contrast between Henty and Filter.  One was as
+"sloppy," clerically speaking, as the other was neat, and as healthy as
+the other was unhealthy.  A. P. would seal the last envelope of his
+day's mail with a bang and rush out of the office to a game of
+baseball; Gordon would hover over his ledger in hope of finding an
+account unproved or untransferred.  He always closed his book gently
+and allowed his hand to rest on it affectionately before consigning it
+to the vault.  The junior drew $150 a year, and Filter $250.
+
+Evan's salary was, by this time, $350.  He had been in the bank almost
+two years.  No man can be in the business that long without _earning_
+at least ten dollars a week.  In office dictionaries, however, the
+words "earn" and "get" are a long distance apart.  Nelson was teller
+and accountant in a branch of four.  The manager was delicate and could
+not do very much work.  Evan ran the cash, liability and general
+ledgers, looked after most of the loans, wrote nearly all returns, and
+superintended every department of the office routine.  He worked three
+nights a week and every day from 8.30 until 6.30, eating lunch in his
+cage while he handed out infectious bank notes.
+
+His was the only bank in Banfield, a village of nine hundred
+inhabitants.  There was a good farming district around the village; a
+big load of stock was shipped every week, and poultry and dairy
+products were profitably handled.  The bank did an uncommonly large
+business, but owing to the size of the town, head office would not
+allow H. H. Jones, the manager, more than three of a staff.  Jones
+relied on the faithfulness and assiduousness of his teller-accountant,
+and Evan struggled through each day as best he could.
+
+The Christmas season is always busy.  Fortunately for Evan, however,
+the manager was feeling better as the holiday neared; he took over the
+cash to let the teller away.  Filter was too poor to go home for
+turkey, and the junior was waiting in great suspense for a cheque from
+home.  Deposits do not constitute all the money that is paid into the
+coffers of Canadian banks: farmers and townsmen help the bank feed,
+clothe and provide recreation for its employes; they send remittances
+regularly to bankclerk sons who must keep up an appearance in spite of
+starvation pay.
+
+"Leave the twenty-third returns for me, Mr. Jones," said the teller,
+with holiday courage and generosity, "and let anything wait you can.
+I'll be back the twenty-sixth."
+
+"All right, Nelson, we'll get along some way."
+
+The manager's words indicated that Evan was indispensable, which was
+practically the case.  He did the work of two men--on the salary of
+half a man or less.  He had been working slavingly at Banfield for a
+year on less than a living wage, learning practically nothing that
+would fit him for anything but bank life.  He had even missed summer
+furlough, because of the manager's illness.  The bank thanked him by
+letter for the sacrifice, and promised him "an extra two weeks later
+on."
+
+What had kept Nelson interested for a solid year in the village of
+Banfield?  Chiefly work; after that a lake and girls.  How many years
+of faithful service do branch banks owe to the attractiveness and
+amiability of town girls!
+
+His work alone provided Evan with all the excitement he needed, and
+when reactions came there was always a young lady to be paddled out on
+the water.  Bank work is entertaining; few clerks do not enjoy it, once
+they have mastered the routine.  Time flies when a fellow is on the
+cash in a busy office; it vanishes when he is also in charge of the
+office as acting-accountant.  Figuring out entries and chasing balances
+is a fascinating occupation, like vaudeville, and just as precarious a
+specialty.
+
+A conscientious bankclerk cannot look on a heap of accumulated work
+with indifference; when he is also ambitious he rolls up his sleeves
+and forgets everything in the debris of vouchers and figures.  Like a
+mole he works away, his eyes blinded (to keep out the muck); unlike the
+mole he never succeeds in building a nest for himself.  The heap
+diminishes gradually before him and he thinks he sees rock-bottom, when
+suddenly an avalanche comes down, obliterating marks of previous effort
+and storing up labor for days, weeks, or months to come.
+
+Surely, there are few occupations more all-possessing than banking.  A
+boy is under a heavy responsibility; the thought makes him proud; pride
+spurs him to his best; he forgets--really forgets--to exercise.  Often
+he is so worn out he cannot take exercise without physical suffering.
+Moreover, the clerical strain makes him sleepy, and, as social affairs
+and night work prevent early retiring, he must get his sleep in the
+morning; thus out-door recreation is neglected.  Whether or not it
+should be, it is.  Excessive inside work takes away the inclination to
+exercise, and only those who know a large number of bankclerks
+understand how serious are the results of this diseased lethargy.
+
+As he sat in the station waiting for his train to Toronto, Evan tried
+to recall one night in the year past when he had had nothing to do.  He
+could not remember one.  When he had not been working there had always
+been a village function of some sort to take up his time and consume
+his vitality.
+
+His head ached now, for he had labored harder than ever during the past
+week, to clear the way for Christmas.  There would be pleasure in
+seeing his folk, but none in the trip--although he was fond of travel.
+He dreaded now the long train-ride.  He yawned and felt miserable.
+
+In the coach he was unable to sleep, and too tired to read.  He had no
+disposition to talk; the only pastime left was to think.  He wondered
+if Frankie still cared for him; if his parents would be impressed with
+his knowledge of banking, and if the bankboys of Hometon would
+acknowledge him a pal.  Selfish as it may seem, his thoughts of Frankie
+were indefinite, and confused with memories of Julia and Lily.
+
+The motion of the train gradually rocked him to sleep in his seat.  He
+dreamt he was being moved to another branch.  When he awoke the
+conductor was shouting "Toronto."
+
+Evan changed cars at Union Station.  This was the second time he had
+been through the city, but he had seen nothing of its life.
+
+The train out Hometon way was crammed with excursionists.  The weary
+bankclerk was obliged to stand for over fifty miles.  He was more than
+half sick when he reached Hometon.  The train was two hours late.
+
+Mrs. Nelson and Lou were at the station to meet Our Banker.  Both of
+them kissed him.  His mother was so happy to see him the tears gleamed
+in her eyes.  Lou sized him up in her old way.
+
+"Say, you look like a city chap, Evan!"
+
+He smiled half-heartedly.
+
+"Gee, I feel rotten," he said; "my head is splitting and I'm sick at my
+stomach."
+
+"You look thin, dear," said Mrs. Nelson, examining him in detail.
+
+"Oh, I'll be all right after a snooze," he replied, lightly, seeing
+that his mother felt considerable anxiety.
+
+The 'bus was full; the Nelsons walked from the depot to their home.
+Evan answered the questions asked him on the way, endeavoring to appear
+cheerful, but took little interest in the old town.  He drank a cup of
+his mother's tea, when they arrived home, then begged off to bed.  Lou
+spread wet cloths on his forehead until he was asleep, and afterwards
+went downstairs to load his stocking.
+
+"Mother, dear," she said, cracking a nut, "Evan looks fierce.  I
+believe he is either worked or worried to death."
+
+Mrs. Nelson sighed.
+
+"This is a funny world," she observed petulantly; "it looks good from
+the outside, but when you come to find out it is a disappointment."
+
+"Oh, mamma," laughed the daughter, "you sound melancholy.  It isn't as
+bad as all that, you know.  His headache will be gone in the morning.
+Christmas trains would put anyone out of commission."
+
+"He looked fagged though, Louie."
+
+"Most bankers do," observed Lou, casually.
+
+Mrs. Nelson looked quizzically at the girl.
+
+"Maybe I should never have encouraged him to enter a bank," she said,
+doubtfully.
+
+The father came in, covered with snow.
+
+"Hello, Santa," cried Lou.
+
+"Did he come?" asked Nelson, returning his daughter's smile, but
+looking somewhat anxiously about.
+
+"Yes," said Mrs. Nelson, "but he was tired and went to bed.  Don't wake
+him up till morning."
+
+"He isn't sick, is he?" asked the father.
+
+"No, just a headache," said Lou.
+
+By and by she went off to bed, upon which Nelson proceeded to unwrap
+several parcels he carried, and fill her stocking.
+
+"It doesn't seem long," he said pensively, "since these two stockings
+weren't big enough to hold anything worth while."
+
+"No, indeed, George.  I often wish they were both children again."
+
+How many times a day is that impossible wish voiced by the mothers of
+every nation!
+
+
+Christmas morning found Lou awake early.  She repeated the pranks of
+childhood, stealing downstairs in the dark to find her stocking.  Evan
+slept on.  His sister peeked into his room at daylight, hoping to find
+him conscious; but he breathed so satisfactorily she overcame the
+temptation to frighten him awake.  Mrs. Nelson would not allow anyone
+to disturb him until breakfast was set, then she went herself to his
+room.
+
+In his dreams he heard his mother calling him, and it seemed to be away
+back in irresponsible days.
+
+"Yes," he answered unconsciously, "I'm up, mother!"
+
+Mrs. Nelson enjoyed his dozing prevarication.  It made her forget that
+he was no longer a sleep-loving schoolboy.  She went quietly to his
+bedside and laid a hand on his forehead.  His eyes opened.
+
+"How are you this morning?" she asked.
+
+"All right mother, thanks.  Is it late?"
+
+She told him breakfast was ready, and he jumped out of bed, whistling
+with surprise.
+
+"I guess I'd better go," she laughed, when he seemed to forget the
+presence of a lady.
+
+"Oh, that's all right," he said, cheerily.  He was feeling good after a
+night's sleep in the bed of his boyhood.
+
+Mr. Nelson was waiting anxiously in the kitchen--they always
+breakfasted there in winter--for Evan and breakfast.  The former soon
+arrived, and the latter was then ready.
+
+"Bon jour," said the father, without nasal and with a hard "j."
+
+"Good morning, George," laughed Evan, using a phrase then popular in
+the "funny" papers.
+
+Our Banker led the way to table.
+
+"I'm as hungry as a cougar," he said.
+
+Lou regarded him in consternation.  "Why, Evan," she cried, "haven't
+you forgotten something?"
+
+He looked at her blankly.  "What?"
+
+"I got mine before daylight," holding up her stocking.
+
+"Oh," he grinned; "I've been away so long I forgot there ever was such
+a thing as Christmas."
+
+"By the way," asked his father, "how did you spend your last?"
+
+"Working," said Evan.
+
+The mother sighed softly.
+
+"You look as though that's all you ever did," continued Mr. Nelson.
+
+"Oh, no," said Evan, promptly, "I've had some good times since that
+Sunday, a year and a half ago, that I spent here.  I have had it sort
+of tough lately and maybe I'm a little run down, but things will ease
+off after awhile."
+
+It is characteristic of the bankman that he lives on the hope that work
+will fall off.  Someone is always telling him, as he is always telling
+himself, that things will slacken; but, somehow or other, the strings
+stay taut.
+
+Evan was quite a different lad now from the schoolboy who first came
+home with bank idioms to tickle his mother with and dumfound his
+sister.  As he sat at the Christmas breakfast table his countenance was
+subdued, almost worried.  The long balance-night orgies were registered
+there; the fixed expression that comes from searching out differences
+and the strain that accompanies each day's balancing of the cash.
+Something more as well--debts!
+
+All bankclerks contract debts.  The careless ones do so thoughtlessly,
+the careful ones reluctantly--both necessarily.  Evan owed about sixty
+dollars, tailor and other bills.  A bankclerk must make a good
+impression on people; he must have a good appearance--head office makes
+that its business.  The clerk's salary--that is nobody's business, not
+even his own.  Evan did not mention the fact that he was in debt, when
+his father asked, good-humoredly,
+
+"Making much money?"
+
+"I'm living," smiled the son.
+
+Lou thoughtlessly said something ill-advised.
+
+"Got a new girl, brother?"
+
+Mrs. Nelson blushed, but her Banker did not.  He laughed.
+
+"That's one thing we learn to forget," he said, brazenly.
+
+The caresses of "sweethearts in every town" had had their effect.  His
+sister gave him a rebuking look.  He saw a question in her eyes and the
+shape of it resembled Frankie Arling's contour.
+
+Some women prefer suspense to disappointment.  Mrs. Arling evidently
+did not, for she asked, palpitatingly:
+
+"When are you going back?"
+
+Evan was embarrassed.  He evaded the question.
+
+"It's too early to speak of that, mother," he fenced.  "Our manager is
+delicate and apt to break down at any time.  I promised to be
+back--soon.  I am the whole thing up at Banfield."
+
+"Are you teller yet?" asked Lou.
+
+"Sure," said Evan, "and then some.  I'm pro-manager."
+
+"Let's see," said his father, dropping a hot egg, "what are they paying
+you now?"
+
+"Three fifty," replied Evan humbly.
+
+It was not the diminutiveness of the figure that sounded so mean to
+him, but its association with the word "pro-manager."  He was not
+ashamed of a low salary, but of a humble position.  If he could
+convince his father that the position he held was responsible and
+man-worthy, he would not mind about the salary.  Bankclerks are
+constantly fed with promotion when it is money they need, but they are
+so trained that elevation practically stands for increase, to them.
+
+"I often run the office for days at a time when the manager is in bed,"
+said Evan.
+
+"And the cash--it's in your charge entirely, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes," said the son, proudly.
+
+Mr. Nelson took a deep draught of strong tea.  Mrs. Nelson sat silent.
+Lou passed her brother a piece of fresh toast she had made for herself.
+
+She got her brother alone after breakfast, ostensibly to show him her
+presents.
+
+"Evan," she said, eyeing him as she used to years before when he had
+done something to puzzle her, "you don't seem very anxious about
+somebody."
+
+He did not parry with a question.
+
+"What's the use, Lou?" he said.
+
+She thought a moment: "I guess there is no use of getting serious on
+seven dollars a week."
+
+Her reasonableness comforted him and he told her so.  They became as
+intimate as when they were children.
+
+"You don't suppose Frank still--well, thinks she is in love with yours
+truly, do you, Lou?" he asked.
+
+"Well--she doesn't act like it," replied Lou, rather indignantly.  "You
+won't be surprised if I tell you something?"
+
+He said he wouldn't.
+
+".....Frankie is going with another fellow!"
+
+Evan drew a silver case of cigarettes from his pocket, took out a
+"smoke" and replaced the case.  Lou regarded him in amazement.
+
+"Why, Evan!" she exclaimed.
+
+He laughed.  His mother smelt the smoke.
+
+"My boy, I'm ashamed of you," she said, coming into the parlor.
+
+He smiled around the cigarette, and said inarticulately:
+
+"I don't smoke many."
+
+"Why don't you use a pipe?" came a deep voice from the kitchen.
+
+"I have a pipe," said Evan.
+
+"Here, take a cigar," returned the father immediately, coming in to
+rarefy the atmosphere.
+
+Promptly Evan twirled his cigarette into the grate and accepted a cigar
+with an adult air.  Lou began laughing, but soon checked herself and
+endeavored to give the youthful debauchee a look of scorn.  Unable to
+carry it out, she gazed out of the window.
+
+"Oh, brother," she said, "come here and see."
+
+He walked to the window.  Strolling down the opposite side of the
+street, apparently on their way to church, were two young people--a boy
+and a girl.  A glance told Evan who the girl was, but he did more than
+glance at the fellow.  The two were coming nearer.
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" said Evan, "I know that guy.  Let's call them in."
+
+Opening the front door he shouted:
+
+"Hey, come on up and see us!"
+
+Frankie hesitated, but her brave escort insisted and she walked
+shamefacedly toward Nelson's home.  Evan allowed himself a few moments
+of rash merriment which greatly surprised his mother and sister.  His
+strange actions were justified--if the women had only known!  The chap
+who stepped in with Frankie was Porter Perry.
+
+Acting on manners he had learned somewhere, the Bonehead grabbed Evan's
+hand before the latter had a chance to greet Frankie.
+
+"Where on earth did you come from?" asked Evan.
+
+"Oh, I left your bank," said Porter, importantly, "because they paid
+such bad salaries.  Then the U---- moved me here."
+
+Frankie distracted Evan's attention.
+
+"How are you, Frank?" he said, feeling mean as he took her little hand
+and saw her blushing face.
+
+"Just the same old way," she replied bravely; "you have changed an
+awful lot though----"
+
+She did not mean anything sentimental, but that kind of an
+interpretation presented itself to her a moment after she had spoken
+and she hurriedly added: "You are thin and paler than you used to be."
+Her eyes alighted on the cigar smoking between his fingers.  "Maybe
+that's the reason," she said, laughingly.
+
+Lou drew her chum off to exhibit those trinkets again.  Mr. and Mrs.
+Nelson were chatting in the kitchen, where the turkey sizzled.
+
+"What post are you on, Evan?" asked Perry.
+
+"Teller and accountant," was the casual reply.
+
+"Gee," exclaimed the Bonehead disconsolately.  He went in search of
+consolation.
+
+"What do they give you?"
+
+"Three fifty," was the still more humble reply.
+
+Porter's face lighted up.
+
+"I draw four fifty," he said, grandly.
+
+"What post?" asked Evan, anxiously.
+
+"Ledger."
+
+This was the first time Evan had had one of the bank's chief
+shortcomings brought home to him--it makes little difference what a
+clerk's intelligence or what his position and responsibility, he will
+be paid according to the time he has served.  He is not rewarded
+according to his works, but paid for length of service.  The business
+offers no incentive to excel.  Why work hard and honestly if you are
+going to get the dead-level wage each year anyway?  Good clerks suffer
+because of the negligence of indifferent ones; but the former bring up
+the average of work--and that is all the bank cares.  The staff of a
+bank is something to be worked en masse; the individual is an
+insignificant part of the works.
+
+Perry seemed fated to be a humiliation to Evan.  Bank luck had thrown
+the Bonehead into the spot where Evan longed to be, and had given him
+enough salary to live on, humbly.  But more ironical still was the
+apparent attachment between Evan's old girl and Perry.
+
+"If she could only have seen him balancing that savings in Mt. Alban,"
+thought Evan, smiling.  Then puffing out a mouthful of smoke, he
+murmured: "Bah! what do I care!"
+
+From that moment he was jolly, to the point of humor.  It was the mood
+of mixed feelings, prominent among which is jealousy, where one waxes
+jocose in spite of himself.  Evan even rallied Frankie on certain
+personal matters.  She did not take it amiss; it rather relieved the
+situation for her.
+
+"Where's Bill, do you know, Evan?" asked Porter.
+
+"No; his signature at Mt. Alban has been cancelled, but I don't know
+what they did with him."
+
+"Either resigned or gone to a city," Perry supposed.
+
+"I think we had better go, Mr. Perry," said Frankie, turning away from
+Lou's Christmas gifts.
+
+"Why, what's your hurry--won't you stay for dinner?" asked Mrs. Nelson.
+
+"Oh, no," said Frankie, "thank you.  Mother has invited Mr. Perry up to
+our place.  He wasn't able to go home."
+
+"How was that?" asked Nelson, poking his nose in the room.
+
+"Work," said Perry, professionally.
+
+"Ledger!" murmured Evan, smiling inwardly.  Notwithstanding, he felt
+more disgusted than amused--he scarcely knew at what.
+
+"We'll see you again before we go, I hope," he said, addressing Frankie
+and her escort as one.
+
+"When do you go?" she whispered to him aside, while the Bonehead was
+laughing at a joke he perpetrated on Lou.  Frankie was beginning to
+weaken.  Evan felt it, and it made him harden his heart.  Such is man's
+disposition.
+
+"Soon," he said, knowing it hurt.
+
+She gazed into his unsmiling eyes a moment, then turned to Lou and
+Perry without speaking.
+
+When she was gone, and Perry, Mrs. Nelson looked disconcertingly at her
+son.  He mentally searched for something to hide his uneasiness and
+divert their minds from Frankie----
+
+"Did you hear me say I must go soon, mother?"
+
+"Yes, how soon, Evan?"
+
+"To-night!"
+
+Mrs. Nelson's dinner was luxurious, but to the whole family it tasted
+flat.  Our Banker must leave early Christmas night.  His Banfield
+friends had wished him "A Merry Christmas."
+
+And he left without saying good-bye to Someone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+_A SPORT GONE TO SEED._
+
+The manager at Banfield sighed in relief when Evan entered the office.
+An afternoon rush was on.
+
+"Can you take this over, Nelson?" he asked, edging away from a cackling
+woman-customer.
+
+Without a word the teller threw his overcoat on a stool and entered the
+cage with his hat on.  Before the wicket farm-folk stampeded,
+struggling to get their noses against the iron railing and to blow
+their breath on the weary-looking teller.  A heap of germ-laden money
+lay temptingly within reach of the rustics, only separated from those
+grimy, grasping fingernails by plate glass.
+
+A shudder passed over Evan as he took his stand in front of the crowd.
+He felt something of what a martyr must feel who faces trial at the
+hands of a mob.  It was market-day.  The Banfield bank had made a
+practice of cashing the tickets of hucksters who came from Toronto and
+bought up the people's produce on a margin.  These tickets had to be
+figured up by the teller, cashed and afterwards balanced.  Many of the
+customers made small deposits, after blocking the way to leaf over
+their money with badly soiled fingers (surely they needn't have been
+quite so dirty!); bought money-orders, opened new accounts "in trust"
+for relatives, asked questions--did everything thinkable to harass the
+teller.
+
+Besides the produce tickets there was the ordinary banking business of
+the day.  Occasionally a regular customer came in to cash a cheque, and
+finding himself unable to get near the wicket went out in considerable
+of a rage, trying to slam the automatically-closing door.  Evan was
+supposed to keep his eye open for these "regulars," but to-day his head
+swam and he was obliged to concentrate on the tickets to avoid
+mistakes.  An error on his part might easily involve him in personal
+loss; but if he "made" anything on the cash, that went to Cash Over
+Account.
+
+A loud voice was heard in the manager's office.
+
+"I won't stand for it," said the voice.  "If you can't wait on me ahead
+of these old women you can do without my business."
+
+"Give me your cheque, Mr. Moore, I'll have it cashed for you," said Mr.
+Jones, conciliatingly.
+
+"No, sir, if I can't----"
+
+The manager, more than half ill, lost his temper.
+
+"Go then and be ----!" he shouted, and left his office to the burly
+intruder.
+
+Moore shouted after the manager, making sure every gossip in the office
+would hear:
+
+"I'll report you!  I'll report you--you're no kind of a manager, and
+I'll have you kicked out of here."
+
+Storming, the big farmer strode from the bank.  Henty, the husky
+junior, was red in the face.  Evan looked at him and smiled.
+
+"What's the matter, A. P.?"
+
+"I was just spoiling for the fray," said Henty, comically; "another
+minute and I'd have thrown that yap out."
+
+After office hours Evan discovered that the cash had not been balanced
+for Saturday the 24th.  He had, therefore, two days' balances on his
+hands--hands that were weary already.  It is always hard work to
+balance after Christmas; but when your head aches, the office air is
+bad, there has been an upheaval with a customer, and you have two
+balances to find--well, it is no fun.  Added to his other troubles,
+there were the returns for the 23rd; they had not yet been written.
+Head office would be sending a memo.
+
+Even a winter's day, in a Canadian bank, is not all gloomy, however.
+Nelson's boarding mistress soothed him at suppertime with a cup of her
+good tea.  Mrs. Terry was a kind soul and a good housekeeper.  She was
+the oasis in Banfield's dusty desert.  Notwithstanding, no cup of tea
+on the most welcome of oases could have prepared Evan for the
+intelligence awaiting him at the office when he got back to work in the
+evening.  The manager sent for him.
+
+"Nelson," he said, "I'm going to resign.  My health won't stand this
+business.  I'm going on a farm."
+
+The young bankclerk was dumfounded.  To think of a man giving up a
+$1,100 position for a farm!  Evan was not old enough to appreciate the
+value of health.  He thought Jones must have had something organically
+wrong with him before ever entering a bank, and that now he acted on
+the promptings of a sour stomach.
+
+"I'm sorry, Mr. Jones," he said quietly; "I've had great experience
+under you."
+
+"Yes," returned the manager, "you're a wonder for your age, Nelson.  Do
+you know how much you are worth to the bank?--just about what I'm
+getting."
+
+Evan felt his head swim.  He forgave Jones the unbalanced "blotter,"
+and had a sudden notion that he could dig up, at that moment, any
+difference that ever happened.
+
+"I'm tired," said Jones, "of being worried by unreasonable asses on the
+one hand and head office on the other.  I'm sick of being a servant."
+
+"How long have you been in the bank?" asked Evan, pensively.
+
+"Twenty years, and my salary is $1,100 with free rent.  I was pushed
+into the business when about sixteen.  At that time banking was a
+profession that all young fellows envied.  I was the proudest man alive
+when they accepted me.  And my folk, they didn't do a thing but plume
+themselves on it."
+
+The teller was silent a while.
+
+"Things change fast in the bank, don't they?" he observed,
+reflectively, thinking of himself and his career.
+
+"You bet they do," replied Jones.  "Banking isn't the same business it
+used to be at all.  Salaries haven't kept up with the times.  A bunch
+of junior men are now employed to fill posts that experienced clerks
+used to occupy.  The bank makes a policy of recruiting--even going to
+Europe, where clerks think five dollars is equal to a pound
+sterling--to keep down expenses.  A boy like yourself can, by heavy
+plodding, do the work of a ten-year clerk.  He may not do it so
+accurately, but he gets it done at last, and that is what the bank
+wants.  He does it, too, on a wage that should frighten future
+battalions, no matter how brave and countrified, away from the
+business."
+
+Evan felt, for the moment, that Sam Robb was speaking.  He thought of
+the day he had accused Robb of cherishing a grudge against the
+business, of being "sore on his job."  But here was meek little Jones
+repeating the sentiments of the Mt. Alban bachelor manager.  It was
+enough to make one think.  Evan did think, and he began to open his
+mind to a wider criticism of the business.  He began to wonder if he
+had been cut out for a bankclerk.  Why had Robb repeatedly made
+anti-banking suggestions to him?  Had he seen incapacity for clerical
+work in the Mt. Alban swipe?  Did Jones discern a similar inaptitude
+for bank service and hint things for the teller's benefit?  Was there a
+chance that he (Evan) possessed faculties that must die in the business
+of his mother's choice, and that these qualifications were plainly
+visible to men older in life and the banking business than himself?  At
+times Evan felt underfitted for the bank, and at other times
+overfitted.  His spirits varied accordingly.  Most of the time,
+however, his mental attitude "balanced," and inactivity of thought was
+the result.  He had reached inertia of mind before his conversation
+that night with Jones was finished.
+
+"Sometimes," he confessed, "I wonder where I am at."
+
+"That describes the average bankboy," replied Jones, promptly.  "He
+drifts along for years in just that frame of mind.  When he rouses
+himself to thought a flood of work comes along and drowns him.  Then he
+sleeps for another month or two.  I don't believe there is a class of
+boys on earth who do less thinking and planning for their future than
+Canadian bankclerks."
+
+"That's funny," said Evan to himself, "I had a hunch when I joined the
+bank that that was the case.  Guess I've grown used to their ways."
+
+Automatically his mind reverted to the work out there in the office
+waiting for him.
+
+"Here I am, wasting time," he said, jokingly, "while two days' balances
+and a mess of other work are waiting for me.  Is there anything else
+you want to speak about, Mr. Jones?"
+
+The manager looked at him with eyes so unprofessional they might never
+have focused on anything so mean as a past-due bill, or a head office
+bull.
+
+"Nelson," he said frankly, "you are the right sort of stuff to succeed.
+You will succeed in the bank: but take my advice and get out of it.  If
+you stick you will some day be a city manager--but get out.  How long
+have you been in the service?"
+
+"Almost two years."
+
+"Well, if you had labored in some other business two years, with the
+intelligence and ballast you have shown around here, you would now have
+had a desk somewhere and a phone at your elbow."
+
+The teller smiled embarrassedly, and rising, asked:
+
+"When will your resignation go?"
+
+"Right away."
+
+While the manager and teller were discussing the philosophy of banking,
+the ledger-keeper and junior were worrying a battered-looking savings.
+Henty was leaning on his elbows and yawning.  His eyes followed endless
+columns of figures, while the ledger-keeper called from the ledger.
+Filter purposely called an amount wrong, and kept going.  When he was
+five accounts past the "baited" balance Henty shouted:
+
+"Hold on, call No. 981 again!"
+
+"Well, I must hand it to you, Ape," said the ledger-keeper
+sarcastically.  "You certainly have a remarkable pair of eyes.  You
+travel several miles behind, like an echo or something, but you always
+get there.  Why don't you save your memory all that extra work?"
+
+The good-natured junior laughed.
+
+"Don't be cross, Gordon," he teased.  "To tell the truth I was thinking
+of Hilda Munn."
+
+Filter looked exasperated.
+
+"How in ---- do you ever expect me to find that difference if you
+travel blindfolded?  I'll bet a dollar we've passed over it."
+
+Nelson came in the office.
+
+"How much are you out?" he asked.
+
+"Ten cents," said Filter; "this book--"
+
+"Wait," interrupted Evan, "do you remember that deposit slip we changed
+after the calling about two weeks ago?  Was it fixed in the ledger?"
+
+Filter's eyes brightened.  He looked up the account and found his
+difference.  Henty regarded the teller with unsophisticated admiration,
+then, on the impulse, grabbed him by the muscles and commenced backing
+him around the office.
+
+"Gee, you're a horse!" said Evan, wrenching himself free; "where did
+you get all that gristle?"
+
+"In the back pasture," interpolated Filter, in jovial spirits now that
+he was balanced.
+
+"Wrong there," said Henty.  "I put on this stock of beef in the rear
+end of a mow one hot summer when the sow-thistles were bad."
+
+While the boys were in good tune Nelson broke to them the news of
+Jones' resignation.
+
+"The deuce!" exclaimed Filter, who rarely went higher.
+
+"We don't need a manager," observed the junior, grinning, "when we've
+got a man who can remember deposit slips for two weeks."
+
+Evan said nothing, but naturally he liked Henty for the flattering
+speech, the more so since Henty usually meant more than half of what he
+said.  Praise is apt to be dangerous to one who draws Evan's salary; he
+felt himself growing more and more dissatisfied.  Evan was awakening to
+a realization of his superiority as a bankclerk.  He was a successful
+clerk, and he knew it; but he also knew, by now, that his success was
+due to labor rather than to special aptitude for that kind of work.  He
+could not banish Jones' words from his mind; if he had expended the
+same amount of energy on some other business he would probably have
+achieved far greater efficiency than would ever be possible in banking.
+He doubted more and more that climbing steps into the bank was equal to
+shinning it up a beanstalk.
+
+For a few days after Jones' conversation with him he was silent and
+thoughtful at his work.  Instead of making poetic memos, like Service,
+in his cage, he made note of the work he waded through, and tried to
+picture himself in a private office.  That was going one further than
+Jones' imaginary desk with the telephone at one's elbow, but the
+imagination is fertile territory.
+
+It is difficult to say where Evan's speculations would have landed
+him--it is difficult to say, although the probability is he would have
+arrived where dissatisfied bank-boys usually do, Nowhere--had not W. W.
+Penton, the new manager, put in a sudden appearance.
+
+It took Penton quite a while to get in the bank door, as he had with
+him a wife and two poodle-dogs, the latter property especially
+requiring much attention and considerable coaching before they would
+condescend to enter the office.  Possibly their pampered puppy noses
+sniffed some of the trouble that was to come.  Dogs are prophetic when
+there is something undesirable to be foretold.
+
+Mr. Jones had gone out on the morning train and would not be back for a
+day or two.  Consequently Evan, next in charge of Banfield branch, was
+obliged to receive the new dictator: such it was Penton's disposition
+to be.
+
+He strutted through the office to the cage, where Evan was busy with a
+customer, and spoke half civilly:
+
+"Are you the accountant here?"
+
+The teller turned around, with a bunch of counted bills in his hand.
+
+"Yes, sir," he said, "just a minute and I'll be out."
+
+"Come out now," said Penton.
+
+Evan finished waiting on the customer, who had been standing in front
+of the wicket long enough, and then obeyed the manager.  The two looked
+at each other challengingly.  Penton's expression was almost a glare.
+The teller stood his ground.  He conceived a ready dislike for the tall
+figure before him.  At length Penton extended his hand.  It was bony
+and cold.  Evan discarded it as quickly as possible and called over the
+rest of the staff for introduction.
+
+Filter shook hands methodically, scarcely raising his eyes to meet the
+bulging, colorless eyes of Penton.  Henty blushed, but his gaze was
+unwavering.  The dogs barked uproariously, scampering to and fro like
+rats.  Mrs. Penton, from the manager's office, tried to quiet them, but
+they seemed bent on carrying out the bluff they had started, imitating
+in that respect their male master.
+
+"I've got an infernal toothache," said Penton, speaking to the junior,
+"would you run across to the hotel and get me some brandy?  If that
+doesn't stop it I'll have to see a doctor."
+
+His tone was more polite now.  Henty left his work and went for the
+liquor.  While he was away the manager and his wife took a hasty glance
+at their living quarters.  She remained there with the terriers, but
+Penton soon came back for his remedy.  When Evan went in he found
+three-fourths of the liquor gone, but the tooth was still aching.  Mr.
+Penton was evidently in agony; he swore.
+
+"Ask Mrs. Penton to come with me to a doctor's, will you?" he said.
+
+Nelson rapped on a door at the end of the hall leading from the office
+into Penton's apartments.  The dogs set up another hullabaloo.  From
+his office the pained manager cursed them heartily.  Henty was ready to
+bubble over with merriment, but the teller motioned him sober.
+
+Mrs. Penton hesitated as she entered her husband's office.  She could
+not have seen the flask, for it was not now in sight.
+
+"Come with me to the doctor's, won't you?" he asked, with the suspicion
+of a whimper in his tone.
+
+She looked behind her before answering.  Evan was hovering near, to run
+errands or show them the way to a physician's.
+
+"All right, Pen."  She spoke timidly.  Evan was sorry for her.
+
+Penton was uneasy; he hesitated when Evan said: "If you don't mind,
+I'll be glad to go with you."
+
+Mrs. Penton spoke out:
+
+"It's awfully good of you, Mr. Nelson.  Mr. Penton may have to take
+gas."
+
+He did.  Nor did ever a youngster take senna less gracefully.  The gas
+alone probably would not have made a madman of him, but mixed with the
+liquor it did.  In the earlier stages of unconsciousness Penton jumped
+from the table and threatened to kill the doctor.  The country
+physician only laughed at the wild and, to Evan, appalling curses and
+threats of the temporary lunatic.  It mattered not to that rustic
+doctor whether his patient carried a stiff neck or a limber one--he
+would do his work just the same.  He happened to be a dentist, which
+was fortunate, for he needed dental knowledge to extract a great tooth
+from the patient.  The further skill of a veterinary surgeon would
+scarcely have been superfluous, Evan thought, amid so much horse-play.
+
+Mrs. Penton seemed very much upset, but she shed no tears.  The teller
+wondered how she could look on at all.  It was the first case of gas he
+had seen, and it not only awed him but filled him with repugnance.
+Painfully was this the case when Penton madly expectorated over an
+incredible distance upon the poor doctor's curtains.
+
+Nelson had always had profound respect for whatever manager he worked
+under.  He looked upon bank officials as something more than men.  The
+reverence of his mother for institutions and things traditional held to
+him.  But as he gazed on the squawking Penton, lying stretched out on a
+board while the village dentist-doctor dragged at a tooth, he had a
+sudden conception of man's equality and his likeness to the beast.
+Even bank-managers were poor, puling cowards in the face of pain, or
+under the influence of a little gas.
+
+Having slept out his unnatural sleep Penton jumped dazedly from his
+board and rushed to the door.  Before anyone could stop him (the doctor
+did not seem anxious to do so) he had reached the street.  Evan ran
+after him, and Mrs. Penton after Evan.  The long form of the new
+manager wobbled across the street toward the bank.  Evan came up with
+it and steadied it.  Mrs. Penton's face was burning red when they
+arrived under cover.
+
+"I'm so sorry this has happened, Mr. Nelson," she said, "for your sake."
+
+"Oh, that's all right, Mrs. Penton," he replied; "I always sympathize
+with anyone who is suffering."
+
+She looked him her thanks.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," she whispered, "did Pen have anything to drink before
+going to the doctor's?"
+
+Evan hesitated before answering.
+
+"A flask of brandy."
+
+"That's what is the matter with him, then," she said, looking sadly
+toward the groaning unfortunate on the couch.
+
+Penton was in a peculiar shade of mind.  He made weird remarks at
+times, spoke sanely occasionally, and groaned continually.  He kept his
+hand to his cheek and swore at the tooth and the doctor alternately.
+Mrs. Penton did not allow his oaths to embarrass her.
+
+"I hope you won't mind," she apologized; "I won't ask you to remain
+more than a few minutes."
+
+"I'm ready to stay as long as you wish, Mrs. Penton," he said.
+
+"Thank you very much.  It is so good of you.  It's awfully nice to have
+a teller like you, Mr. Nelson.  Mr. Penton was afraid--we were afraid
+we mightn't--you know, like the staff.  I am so glad to find you so
+kind; I'm sure you will get along splendidly with Pen."
+
+Again Evan was flattered.  Here was a manager hoping he would not have
+to quarrel with his teller!  That was, virtually, Mrs. Penton's
+admission.
+
+Evan did not need this additional evidence of Penton's weakness.  The
+toothache episode had satisfied him.  He heard for days the manager's
+squawking, and saw before him the manager's cravenness.
+
+Jones had come and gone: the new manager had taken over the bills and
+the cash.  Penton's tooth was better, but he was in a bullying humor.
+One night he called the teller before him for review.
+
+"Now, Mr. Nelson," he said, assuming an imperious tone, the absurdity
+of which amused the steady-eyed listener, "as you know, I am appointed
+manager here.  This is my first branch, and I want to make it a
+success.  Needless to say, I need your help, since you are my teller.
+I want you to see that the junior men perform their duties properly."
+
+The flattery intended to be conveyed in "junior men" did not appeal to
+Evan.  He sat silent, observing, never taking his eyes from the
+manager's.
+
+"I want my branch to pay, and I want my town to appreciate the fact
+that a trained banker is running things here now.  I am a friend of Mr.
+Jones, but I tell you he did things in an unprofessional way.  I want
+things done according to the standard rules of banking.  I am a
+disciplinarian, and the sooner my staff realizes that the better it
+will be for them."
+
+The teller reddened with anger.  Penton probably thought it was
+timidity.  But as Nelson did not speak the other was not enlightened.
+
+"Now," continued Penton, "I want you to be my mouthpiece to the junior
+men.  Make them understand I am here to do things my own way.  No more
+private banking methods--"
+
+"Excuse me, Mr. Penton," interrupted Nelson, vibrantly, in spite of a
+desire to ignore with silence, "Mr. Jones had twenty years' banking
+experience."
+
+Penton altered his tone.
+
+"Don't misunderstand me, Mr. Nelson," he said, smiling a smile of
+defiance and diplomacy, "I am not knocking Mr. Jones.  But you will
+soon see the results of my more professional methods.  I got my
+training in the oldest and most aristocratic banking house in the
+country."
+
+The lecture eventually came to an end.  It was on a par with anything
+Penton was liable to say or do.  Exhausted after the effort, he
+withdrew to his apartments behind the bank.  Evan entered his box and
+slammed the door.  Two faces flattened themselves against the sides of
+the cage.
+
+"Boys," said the teller coolly, but in a tone they were not used to
+from him, "there's going to be ---- to pay around here."
+
+"What's wrong?" asked Filter.
+
+"Nothing," said Evan, "but this new manager is going to get in wrong.
+I for one won't stand for his bluffing."
+
+The teller went on to deliver the message given him.  He scarcely
+fulfilled Penton's wishes in the delivery, however.
+
+"I'm with you, Nelson," said Henty, very red in the face and
+ludicrously serious.
+
+"You bet," said Filter, forgetting his ledger for the moment.
+
+After locking up, that afternoon, Nelson went for a walk around the
+pond.  He was sick at heart.  He wondered what would happen under
+Penton's regime, he was certain something disastrous would.  After
+supper he went to the post office, hoping to hear from home.  He wanted
+to forget the bank and its worries for a while.  Two letters were in
+the mail for him, one from Julia and the other from Lily.  He dropped
+into the bank to read them and sat in the manager's office.  A rap came
+to the office door.
+
+"Come in," he cried.  Mrs. Penton entered, wretched-looking.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Nelson," she cried, softly, "I need your help."
+
+He arose from his chair and stood gazing at her.
+
+"He's drinking again," she said; and the tears flowed when Evan's
+interest was apparent.
+
+"Where is he?"
+
+"At the hotel," she sobbed.
+
+Evan went out and hurried to the town bar.  There he was, the tall
+manager, laughing insanely at the vile talk of Banfield's worst
+characters; drinking to the health of debauchees who pictured Heaven as
+an eternal beer-garden surrounded by living fountains and falls of
+whiskey.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+_THE SEED MULTIPLIES._
+
+Henty was accessible by telephone.  He answered Evan's excited summons.
+Between them the boys got Penton home and in bed.  It was no simple
+task, either.  The manager was obstreperous, but at the same time he
+showed the white feather.  Drink could not have made him so ridiculous:
+there must have been something ridiculous in his nature.
+
+"Why don't you let me alone?" he whined.
+
+"Because," said Evan, "you're disgracing the bank.  If you don't come
+home I'll report you to head office."
+
+They were on the street.  Penton shuddered and went with them more
+willingly when the threat had penetrated his clogged brain.
+
+"You won't report me, will you?  You won't report me?" he repeated in a
+fawning manner, fearful and pitiful.
+
+"Not if you cut this out," said the teller.
+
+"I'll c-cut it out, old c-cock," laughed Penton raspingly, swaying to
+the poison in his blood, "me f-for the water wagon after this."
+
+He raved about himself until they had him in bed, then he raved about
+everything.
+
+"Do you want me to stay a while, Mrs. Penton?" asked the teller.
+
+"No thank you, Mr. Nelson," she replied, wearily; "he will be all right
+now.  Oh, I'm so afraid this will be talked of all over town.  Do you
+think so?"
+
+"Nobody saw him," said Nelson consolingly, "but a few drunks, and
+anything they say won't matter."
+
+"Oh, I hope so," she said; "it would be dreadful if the town turned
+against us.  This is our first branch, you know, and a scandal like
+this might ruin us."
+
+"Don't worry, Mrs. Penton; people are kind in this town, if they _are_
+behind the times.  They always forgive the first offence, and sometimes
+more.  During the two weeks Mr. Penton has been here he has made lots
+of friends."
+
+Mrs. Penton began to be comforted, for what the teller said was true.
+Penton had a way with him among people; it was a hypocritical way, of
+course, but the affectation of it was not clear to the kind, simple
+people of Banfield.  His ignoble flattery passed for amiability and
+good-will.
+
+"It won't occur again," said Mrs. Penton, thoughtfully; "this will be a
+lesson to him.  I wish you would frighten him, Mr. Nelson."
+
+Henty had to smile.  The manager's wife also smiled then.  It was
+impossible to look worried or cross in the face of what Filter called
+"the ape's grin."  Evan, however, was the first to sober.  He was
+thinking of the day he had entered the bank, and how he had thrilled at
+sight of a living manager, an appointee of head office.  Now he was
+asked to frighten one of these potentates into subjection.
+
+"I'll make him believe the people of the town are sore," said the
+teller, pensively.
+
+As they walked to their boarding-houses up the frosty street, the two
+boys discussed matters.
+
+"I feel kind of sorry for him," said Henty; "he must be a regular
+booze-fighter."
+
+"Yes.  I wonder did head office know it when they sent him up here?"
+
+Henty had no idea.  Being simply a junior he did not venture an opinion
+concerning head office.  He did express himself about the unofficial
+Penton, however.
+
+"I don't like him, Nelson."
+
+"No," said Evan, "he is a mistake.  I see trouble ahead for us.  I
+can't understand why the bank sent him up here.  He has evidently been
+used to a fast life, and there's no excitement here for him except
+booze."
+
+Henty had reached his lodging.  With a "good-night" and a sigh he
+entered the cold storage where he put in the nights.
+
+Evan, drawing one hundred and fifty dollars a year more than the
+junior, went further up the hill and landed in a warmer room.  He
+lighted a lamp and prepared to thoroughly peruse a couple of letters.
+They were more than a couple, they were a pair.  Julia reminded him of
+the "perfectly lovely" times they had spent together, and Lily spoke of
+the "grand evenings" they had walked or driven in.  The Mt. Alban girl
+intimated that she was without "such a friend" now, and the Creek Bend
+girl spoke about the scarcity of "the right kind of fellows."  Both
+letters were a challenge for Evan to act consistently with smile or
+kiss bestowed in the past, and a reminder that girls do not forget so
+readily as bankclerks might wish.
+
+Folding the two little love-notes together, he held them above the lamp
+chimney and watched them burn.  He did not wear the expression of a
+Nero, but of an Abram offering up that which was part of himself.  He
+was not burning sheets of paper, but leaves from his life: sheets that
+he declared must become ashes to him--and to them.
+
+"Yes," he thought, "it is better to make them angry than to string them
+along and break their hearts at last."
+
+He continued to reason with himself:
+
+"In the first place, I can't tell which of them I like best; therefore
+I don't love either of them.  In the second place, it will be years
+before I shall draw enough money to marry on."
+
+There was a third place, but Evan wanted to avoid it, for in that
+"place" sat Frankie Arling.  The Bonehead also sat there, with his arms
+around Frankie.
+
+Unable to banish this picture from his imagination, Evan finally
+delivered himself up to thoughts of Frankie: only in that way could he
+depose the redoubtable Porter.
+
+The more Evan compared Frankie with Julia Watersea and Lily Allen, and
+with others whom he had met, the surer he felt, of her superiority.  He
+regretted having hurt her at his home on Christmas Day, and knew he had
+done it because he cared for her.  Thoughts of Perry gave him a sick
+feeling in his vitals, but he could not convince himself that Frankie
+cared anything about "the porter."  What had become of all the other
+Hometon bankclerks she had temporarily tantalized?
+
+In his quiet room the Banfield teller mused.  After two years of
+banking he felt himself further from Frankie Arling than he had felt
+the day he went away.  He was within a few days of nineteen now; his
+views on everything had undergone a change.  Yet, he knew that he was
+more desirous than ever of marrying Frankie.  There are moments when we
+see our hearts before us under an X-ray more wonderful than that used
+in medicine.  Evan was given a glimpse of his inmost self, and what he
+saw was startling to him.  He knew he loved Frankie Arling, and that he
+would be happy if he married her, even at nineteen!  Age probably has
+less to do with the proper kind of marriage than is often supposed.
+There are boys of seventeen who would make good husbands, whereas some
+men are never fit.  Evan knew he could have settled down at nineteen
+and made a success of marriage--if he could only have afforded it.
+
+Knowing, though, the futility of dreaming against such odds as seven
+dollars a week and the bank system of increases, he forced his mind off
+matrimony and thought of Frankie only as an unattainable object he
+loved.  In the midst of his dreaming loomed up again visions of other
+girls, chiefly Julia and Lily.  He felt guilty for having shown them
+attention.  He experienced remorse, for it was possible he had (the
+phrase passed facetiously through his brain) "built better than he
+knew."  The letters just burnt were not at all comforting in this
+connection.
+
+Nelson had met bankboys who delighted in what they called "stringing
+skirts."  Those fellows were despicable to him; they were scarcely
+worth despising.  And their numbers were altogether too large.  He had
+met others--very many--who were not in the despicable class, but who
+also were guilty of unfaithfulness.  Why, he asked himself, were
+conditions in the bank conducive to such a state of affairs?
+
+It was, experience answered, because a fellow's mind was unoccupied
+after hours, and for many other reasons.  He was among the most
+attractive people, and was obliged to dress well and be amiable.  If
+girls were attracted to him it could do business no harm--and business
+comes first.  When a move came along a fellow was lonely for a while
+and longed to be back at the town he had just left.  Naturally he wrote
+a more or less pathetic letter to the girl who had liked him best, and
+she, being also a little lonely, replied with a touch of tenderness.  A
+fellow came back with another letter, stronger than the first, written
+in a particularly dark hour, and the girl left behind began to feel
+herself a party to something serious.  Letters went back and forth
+until a fellow was invited out in the new town, or otherwise met
+another fair one.  Then his letters dropped off.  Probably he liked the
+girl left behind and could have fallen in love with her; but he knew he
+could not hold out hopes of marriage, and why spoil her chances by
+writing any longer than was absolutely necessary?  Sometimes the girl
+left behind persisted in her writing.  Several of them, if he had
+worked in a number of towns, usually did.  A fellow could not be rude
+to them--he must let them down gradually; so he wrote regularly for a
+while, praying that the growing frigidity of his tone would finally
+discourage.
+
+Thus it went, town after town.  The bankman drifted along, taking no
+girl seriously, but using them all so, out of necessity.  If he was an
+unscrupulous person he enjoyed it; if he knew what conscience meant he
+periodically took himself to task--but never quite solved the problem.
+There was no solution to it.  One could not be a hermit or a boor
+because girls had hearts and the bank had none.  He must play the game.
+He was taking a big chance of having his own heart cracked, and thought
+of danger for himself fostered recklessness toward the weaker sex.
+
+Something, a solemn voice it seemed, whispered to Evan that a young man
+of iron could go through the ordeal of eight or ten years' bank service
+and run the gauntlet of attractive femininity without injury to a
+single soul; but young men are not made of iron.  Evan wondered if
+those who wrote the Rules and Regulations had daughters, or if they
+remembered the letters they had received when they were clerking in
+little towns.  Why didn't they take the whole of human nature into
+consideration when they laid down laws to govern employes?  The fact
+that they had ignored the right of young men to marry at a reasonable
+age had wrought a thousand published wrongs and ten thousand wrongs
+that would never reach the press.
+
+In his silent room the young teller rebelled against the bonds that
+held him and his fellows.  He counted the years that must elapse before
+he could hope to marry.  At one hundred dollars increase per year it
+would take him seven years more to earn $1,050.  In the East the
+"marriage minimum" was $1,000, in the West $1,200.  Like Jacob he must
+work seven years for his wife.  And then would it be Rachel or someone
+else?  Would Frankie wait such an age for him?  Could any man expect a
+girl to believe in the seriousness of his intentions for eighty-four
+months--a year of weeks?  He believed she would wait if she understood,
+but how could a girl understand "business" like that?
+
+The teller's mind grew darker as he mused.  He saw only gloom ahead.
+The drunken manager staggered into his room, in spirit, and delivered
+another lecture on the "aristocracy of banking."  Bah!
+
+Evan filled with rebellion as his situation stood out before him--a
+sudden pain in the head warned him that he was worrying.  Then came a
+slight reaction.
+
+"Pshaw!" he muttered, "I'm putting myself in a rotten humor.  I'll feel
+better in the morning."
+
+And so he did.  The "light of common day" is often preferable to the
+illusions of night.  In spite of his disturbed state of mind Evan had
+slept well.  Penton, too, had slept, but not well.  Judging from his
+appearance in the morning, his dreams must have been diabolical.
+
+When the teller entered the office Penton greeted him sullenly.
+
+"Well," he said, grouchily, "I suppose I made a nice mess of things
+last night.  I suppose every ---- gossip in town will talk about it for
+months."
+
+In spite of his grouch the manager looked frightened.  Anyone could see
+he was worried.
+
+"Not many know of it," said Evan, indifferently.
+
+"Do you think they will blab?"  Penton was still unrepentant.  His
+brazenness irritated the teller, who answered simply:
+
+"Yes."
+
+Penton looked at him angrily.
+
+"See here," he said, imperiously, "I don't give a ---- what these
+yokels think of me.  I am manager here, and if I want to take a glass
+that's my business; understand?"
+
+Evan made no reply.  He walked doggedly from the manager's office to
+his cage and set to work.  Penton stood pulling at the inflamed tip of
+his upper lip.  His bluffing had failed.  When he approached Nelson it
+was humbly.
+
+"I hope you'll try to fix things up as much as possible, old man," he
+said.
+
+Under the circumstances Evan would rather have been called Old Nick
+than "old man," but he nodded obedience to the manager's wishes and
+went about his business.
+
+"I promise it won't happen again," said Penton, grovelling.
+
+"It will soon pass off," said Evan.
+
+He might have meant that Penton's resolution would disappear.  However,
+his words were consolation to the nerveless manager, who, from that
+time on, was quite servile.  He ingratiated himself with the teller at
+every opportunity.  His mock humility was loathsome to Evan and made
+him fear indefinitely.  He worried over it.  But he could not decide
+what to do or how to treat Penton.
+
+Business was rushing.  The work in the box had gradually increased, and
+other work had piled up since the new manager's arrival.  Jones, though
+sick half the time and half sick the rest of the time, had done more
+than Penton would do.  Penton, despite his criticism on the former
+manager's system, made no real effort to establish anything better.  He
+often pointed out "how we used to do it in the M---- Bank," and
+sometimes Evan agreed with him but he never took off his coat and dug
+out the submerged junior or ledger-keeper as Jones had done, He seemed
+to be engaged forever in a mental calculation.  Frequently he did not
+hear questions addressed to him.  What little work he undertook was
+haggled at in spasms and usually left for the accountant to finish.
+
+All the boys were loaded down with routine.  They never thought of
+leaving the office until six o'clock, and night-work was now the rule.
+Evan began to have headaches.
+
+The people of Banfield kindly let Penton's first offence pass, as it
+had been prophesied they would.  Everyone knew about it, of
+course--what village of nine hundred population ever lost sight
+entirely of such a piece of news?
+
+Mrs. Penton was delighted to know that she and her husband had not been
+disgraced.  Penton pretended, now the danger was past, that he would
+not have cared.
+
+"It's a funny thing," he said, with an adjective, "if a man can't take
+a social drink without insulting the town."
+
+This remark was addressed to the whole staff.  At times Penton was
+absurdly pompous and uncommunicative before the boys; at other times he
+entered into a mysterious intimacy with them, a relationship
+distasteful to them.  They preferred his professional tactics to those
+others.
+
+"By heck," said Henty one afternoon, after one of Penton's good-fellow
+demonstrations, "I naturally hate that devil!"
+
+Nelson laughed immoderately, in the way one laughs who has been under a
+strain too long.  Filter, even, thought the remark funny.
+
+"I understand," he said, "that Penton has bought all his furniture on
+credit from Hunter's."
+
+"Who told you?" asked Evan, interestedly.
+
+"Jack Hunter," replied the ledger-keeper.
+
+Nelson consulted his thoughts.  He was conscious of an addition to the
+vague fear he already cherished.
+
+The end of the month (January) kept the Banfield staff so busy they had
+little time to discuss the one great theme--Penton.  He kept to his
+office pretty well and seemed to read the newspaper for hours every
+day.  He did work a little on the loan return, after Evan had balanced
+the liability ledger, but left the totals to his teller.  For one
+thing, however, Penton deserved credit: he was the most industrious
+signer of names that ever escaped jail for forgery.  He even initialed
+items on the general ledger balance-sheet, where initials were
+ridiculous, to give the impression that he had checked the work.
+
+For the first week in February the boys worked every night.  Henty's
+face kept its color, but Nelson began to look like Filter.  The
+ledger-keeper plodded so slowly and fondled his ledger so tenderly, his
+pasty face did no worse than remain pasty.  There was new vim for him
+in every new account opened.  He knew the names of every man, woman and
+child in his ledger.  He might be moved away any time, and all his
+special knowledge would become useless to him--Filter knew that--but he
+did not live in his ledger from a sense of duty: he just loved
+clerically killing time.  He was too lazy or too unoriginal to think,
+so he kept his mind occupied with insignificant things, and made an
+ideal clerk.
+
+It was afternoon, toward the end of a certain week in February.  Henty
+had been down to a grain elevator at the station with a draft.  It
+usually took him a long time to deliver a draft in that direction,
+because Hilda Munn lived out there; but this day he came back rapidly
+and rushed excitedly up to the teller's box.
+
+"Nelson!" he whispered ominously, tapping the cage door.
+
+Evan turned around and smiled at the expression of A. P.'s face.
+
+"What's the matter, Henty?"
+
+Filter had foregone the temptation to make an entry, and stood
+listening and watching.
+
+"It's Penton.  He's drunk again.  He took the 3.30 train south."
+
+"Was he alone?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Immediately Evan went and found Mrs. Penton.  She was nursing the white
+poodles.  They nearly went mad when a stranger entered the domain of
+their mistress.
+
+"Mrs. Penton," said the teller, "do you know where Mr. Penton is?"
+
+She paled at once.  Evan could see that she lived in dread of her
+husband's habit, and was on the watch for outbreaks.
+
+"Has anything happened, Mr. Nelson?" she asked, painfully.
+
+"Yes.  He's gone on the southbound."
+
+"To Toronto!" she cried.  "Was he intoxicated?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+The teller gazed on her in pity.  After she had stared at him a while
+her eyes saw sympathy and understanding, and she cried.  He assured her
+the work at the office would not be neglected, and promised to forge
+Penton's name to the daily cash-statement so as to keep the matter a
+secret from head office.  She clutched his shoulders and sobbed against
+them.  His heart ached for her, and he promised to help Penton all he
+could.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Nelson," she stammered, wiping her cheeks, "if only Pen were
+like--like you!"
+
+Then she wept again.  The spell over, she inquired about the trains and
+found she could get to Toronto in the evening.
+
+"I know where to find him," she said.  "We lived in Toronto a year.
+Mr. Nelson, you can't imagine how I have suffered through it all.  When
+I married Pen I knew he took an occasional glass, but I didn't dream
+that he was a drunkard."
+
+"Is it as bad as that, Mrs. Penton?"
+
+"It is as bad as it can be."  She spoke excitedly.  "I have known him
+to spend fifty dollars in one night, when he was only making nine
+hundred dollars a year.  (We got married by special influence.)  It
+just seems as though something draws him toward a debauch every little
+while.  I'm afraid this small town will be our ruination."
+
+Evan tried to make her load lighter and, in a degree, succeeded.  There
+is no burden so heavy that true sympathy will not budge it a little.
+Mrs. Penton coaxed him to have tea with her; preparing it, she said,
+would occupy her mind.  She couldn't bear to stay alone.  The teller
+pretended to have pleasure in accepting her invitation.  There was a
+certain amount of novelty in eating alone at a table with a strange
+young woman.  Still, the circumstances were not very romantic.
+
+Neither were the circumstances surrounding Penton's return.  He
+contrived to get away from his wife in Toronto and board a train for
+Banfield.  He arrived several hours ahead of her, and advertised
+himself all over town as something to be pitied.  This was two days
+after his drunken flight.  When Mrs. Penton came on the scene the
+manager was standing helplessly before the staff, crying like a bruised
+youngster.  Evan sat up all night with him, studying the pathos and
+humor of delirium tremens.  The drink demon is a tragic devil, but he
+has fits of fun.
+
+For days the manager could not sign his name.  The teller did it for
+him, feeling as he did so that he was supporting a rotten structure
+that must soon fall.  He did not picture himself among the debris,
+however.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+_TROUBLE COMES._
+
+By quarrelling with his wife and kicking the pups Penton managed to
+entertain himself, apart from the keg, for over a month.  Then he went
+and did it again.  He took some money to a place called Burnside to
+cash cattle tickets for a drover who did business at the Banfield
+branch.  When he got back he was in a boisterous state of intoxication.
+
+"Hello, old kid!" he said to Henty, whom he met at the door of the bank.
+
+Henty backed up and went in the office again, to consult with the
+teller.
+
+"This is getting monotonous," said Nelson.  "What would you do about
+it, A. P.?"
+
+"Report the son-of-a-gun," said Henty, florid of countenance.
+
+"Sure," said Filter; "he'll be holding us up some of these days at the
+point of a gun."
+
+Evan thought over Filter's remark, for he had been tempted to entertain
+similar notions himself.  What might not happen if Penton got in a
+drunken craze?  The teller worried more and more as he speculated on
+the possible outcome of events.
+
+Mrs. Penton got the manager to bed and then came out to the office.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," she whispered through the cage, "could I speak to you?"
+
+Evan went into the manager's office with her.
+
+"I know you are going to tell head office about it this time," she
+said, despairingly.  "It isn't right for me to ask any further
+consideration from you.  The business here will be ruined."
+
+"I won't say anything," replied Nelson, "until some of the customers
+begin to kick.  I have an idea they will not do any reporting without
+warning us, though."
+
+The manager's wife sighed.
+
+"It would be a relief, I sometimes think," she said, "to get back to
+the city.  Pen was busy there and it kept, his mind occupied.  I see
+there is no hope for him here.  The trouble is head office might drop
+him from the service altogether.  Of course, his relatives in Berlin
+are big depositors--"
+
+"That might help some," said Evan, treasonably.  Then, "Don't give up,
+Mrs. Penton.  We may be able to scare him good for another month or so."
+
+She made an effort to smile, but it was a tired one.
+
+"You are my only hope, Mr. Nelson," she said, forcing back her tears.
+"I'm going to tell you something more."
+
+He wondered what was coming next.
+
+"Pen," she continued, "is in debt, I'm afraid.  How could he help it
+when he spends so much on liquor?  His salary here is only nine hundred
+dollars and rent, you know."
+
+That seemed a great deal to Evan, who got board for $3.25 per week.
+
+"Do you mean he owes money in town?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+The teller recalled what Filter had said Jack Hunter told him.  If the
+manager owed Hunter money, he probably was in debt elsewhere, too.
+
+"Well, Mrs. Penton," answered Evan, "I don't know what to say.  I wish
+I had the money myself to lend.  Do you know what I get?"
+
+She blushed.
+
+"It is only your advice I ask, Mr. Nelson," she replied, sadly.  "As to
+your salary, I think they ought to pay you more than Pen."
+
+Evan's chest went out an inch or two, but he found himself still
+unequal to the task of advising her.  Things would have to take their
+course, as they always do.
+
+Now, in the course of things, there came a very busy day.  The manager
+had been sober for a fortnight; he sat in his office pulling at that
+long upper lip of his, and consuming inwardly with the fierce desire
+that drunkards know.  Perhaps no one sympathized with him sufficiently.
+Who, after all, knows anything about hell but those who have been there?
+
+Before the teller's box thronged women and men from all the country
+roundabout, smelling strongly of poultry.  It was such a cold day that
+the bank was chilly and windows could not be raised.  The aroma that
+arose before the wickets was indescribably potent.  Evan felt his head
+swim and his stomach sicken.  But work was behind him, pushing him
+along; he knew he must get through somehow.  Filter was not able to
+handle the cash, especially on a market-day, and Evan would not have
+trusted Penton in the cage, under the circumstances.  If anything
+happened the teller was responsible for the cash: he would be taking a
+chance on Penton--and a fellow can't afford to be a sport on seven
+dollars a week.
+
+When a man fills a position where he is practically indispensable, so
+far as the work, not the position, is concerned, his job is his master.
+Many a bankboy, on the verge of collapse, is unable to leave for a
+single day his unhealthy environment.  Some, like Evan, are tied down
+by circumstances; the majority of them are bound by their own foolish
+tenacity.  All of them realize, sooner or later, that their labor was
+in vain.  When their health is gone, like Jones', and their efforts
+stored up in bank buildings, those modern Egyptian obelisks, who knows
+or rewards them?  If they find themselves, after years of service,
+unfitted both mentally and physically for anything but clerical work,
+and yet unable to longer endure the strain of it, what are they going
+to do?  The man who sells his vitality is a fool, but he who gives it
+away is worse than a fool.  The trouble with us fools is that we don't
+believe it about ourselves.  Evan was sceptical of the harm bank toil
+was working upon his constitution.  He would not allow himself to think
+his health was failing rapidly--or even slowly.
+
+Silver was always in great demand on market days.  In the midst of his
+rush, this very busy day, Evan discovered that he had not brought from
+the safe enough quarters to carry him through.  A murmur arose from the
+stampeders when he left his box and walked to the vault.  The murmur
+became a grumble when he fumbled the vault combination without opening
+the door.
+
+"Filter," he called, impatiently, "open this hanged vault, will you?  I
+can hardly see the numbers."
+
+Calmly the ledger-keeper turned the combination, clicking it open
+unhesitatingly.  He turned and winked at Henty.
+
+Evan brought out a bag and deposited it on a small table in the cage,
+there for the accommodation of odorous money parcels and noon lunches.
+On opening the silver he found there were five packages of quarters,
+one hundred dollars each.  He took one package out, tied up the bag,
+and set it under the table out of the way.
+
+His cash was two dollars short that day.  Too weary to look for his
+"difference" in the mess of work he had gone through, he put it up.
+But it worried him.  He could not afford even so small a loss, for he
+was in debt as it was.  His father had sent him a remittance, but he
+had sent it back, saying: "If I can't keep myself by this time, I'd
+better give it up as a bad job."  He was too game, when writing home,
+to put blame for failure on the bank, so he took it himself.  But he
+would not take money.
+
+Locking-up time came late that market day, for the hucksters' list was
+enormous.  The teller had paid out five hundred dollars in small bills
+and silver.  He yawned as he packed away the filthy money in his tin
+box, and yawned as he carried it into the vault.
+
+Henty and Filter were preparing to go up to supper.
+
+"Wait, fellows," said Evan, "I'll go with you."
+
+Penton sat in his office as the boys passed out.  He had not initialed
+the teller's book, but had watched him lock the cash in the safe.
+
+"I suppose you'll be back to-night," said the manager, not looking at
+any of the boys in particular.
+
+"No," said Evan, "I won't.  My head aches already."
+
+But he did come back an hour later, and his head ached worse than ever,
+for he was worrying about the bag of silver he had forgotten to take
+from under the cage-table and lock up in the safe.
+
+There it was, tied up, and how and where he had left it.  With a sigh
+of relief he picked it up and locked it in the vault.  Only Evan and
+Filter had the vault combination.  Penton said he preferred not to have
+it, as he did not want to accommodate farmers after hours; it had never
+been done in the M---- Bank, where he had received his training.
+
+It is customary for a manager to check the teller's cash once in a
+while.  He is supposed to do it irregularly so as to keep the teller in
+constant suspense.  Market day at Banfield was Tuesday.  Wednesday
+afternoon Penton came round to count Nelson's cash.  In the morning,
+first thing, the bag of silver had been locked in the safe, inside the
+vault.
+
+There were two compartments in the safe; in one of them the "treasury"
+(a sort of local rest fund) and certain documents were kept; in the
+other, the cash box and bags of specie.
+
+Penton first checked the bills and silver in the teller's drawer and
+tin box, then got the treasury notes and found them right.
+
+"How much gold have you on hand?" he asked the teller.
+
+Evan told him.
+
+"I guess it's all right, but I'll count it, anyway."
+
+He did, and found it correct.
+
+"Bring me the silver, will you?" he said; "I might as well check
+everything while I am at it."
+
+Evan brought several bags from the safe, and stood by while Penton
+opened them.  When they came to the bag of quarters that had been left
+under the table for an hour the previous day, they made a discovery.
+At least Evan did.  He found a package of one hundred dollars missing.
+
+"What!" exclaimed Penton.
+
+"Yes, there were five yesterday when I opened the bag, and I just took
+one out.  There are only three here now."
+
+The teller felt his head throb.  Penton grinned sceptically.
+
+"My dear man," he said, "you're mixed.  The money was only left out for
+an hour, you say.  No one was in here but myself."
+
+Evan felt a chill.  He was just as sure Penton had stolen one of those
+hundred dollar packages as he was that one had been stolen.
+
+"Check your blotter," went on the manager, with a strange accent and a
+fearful glow in his colorless eye; "you couldn't possibly have paid out
+an extra hundred in silver.  Good G----! man, you're crazy."
+
+Mechanically the teller went over the additions in his blotter.  That
+was always the first thing to do in a cash difference that looked like
+a mistake in addition.  The blotter was found correct.  Next came the
+vouchers.  Penton worked assiduously on them with the teller.  His mind
+somewhat clarified by checking, Evan began to think.  Penton had said
+it was impossible to pay out one hundred dollars too much over the
+counter in silver--as it was.  If he could trace the silver back to
+when the cash had been checked before, the difference could easily be
+located in the silver.  He offered the suggestion.  The manager made a
+gesture of impatience.
+
+"I tell you," he said, "there must be a mistake somewhere; either in
+your work, or else you paid out one hundred dollars too much in bills
+and--you've been counting the silver wrong for days or weeks, that's
+it!"
+
+Nelson knew he had not.  Fortunately for him the manager had checked
+the cash a week before, and initialed it as correct.  While Penton
+followed with his eyes, Evan ran over his cash-statement book, showing
+the decrease in silver each day to be about twenty-five dollars.
+Market days always took about one hundred and twenty-five dollars.  But
+there was a falling off between Monday and Tuesday this week of two
+hundred and twenty-eight dollars.
+
+Penton stared glassily a moment, as the boys had often seen him do.
+Then his cunning came to the rescue, as it always did.
+
+"That bag you have been counting as five hundred dollars has only
+contained four packages.  The loss is away back somewhere, and this is
+a coincidence.  There has been a double error."
+
+Evan knew differently, but felt that he could not say anything
+plausible.  He was silent.  Penton waited a moment before remarking:
+
+"It'll come pretty hard on you, old man, with your salary."
+
+So diabolically triumphant was Penton's tone that it filled Nelson with
+a horror.
+
+"I'll quit the bank before I'll put it up," he said, gutturally.
+
+"That would make things look suspicious," replied Penton.
+
+So it would!  Evan had not thought of that.  Penton seemed to have
+figured the situation out fully; directly he said:
+
+"Well, let's sit down and write head office the particulars.  They may
+let you off, seeing you are getting only three hundred and fifty
+dollars."
+
+Realizing his powerlessness, Evan obeyed.  For the first time in his
+Banfield management Penton took command.  He was self-possessed; acted
+like one who was right at home.  Probably he was, in that kind of a
+game.
+
+Nelson wrote unsteadily in longhand to his manager's dictation, and was
+strengthened in the conviction that Penton had stolen that parcel of
+silver.  Usually the manager composed hesitatingly, especially when
+addressing head office, but now he was glib, and seemed familiar with
+his subject.  He even appeared to be in suppressed good humor over the
+matter.
+
+"Don't look so grim, old man," he said, oilily, "they'll not make you
+put it up.  Why, that would be absurd, on your allowance."
+
+An idea struck Evan.  Penton, if he had taken the money, probably hoped
+his teller's low salary would influence head office toward leniency.
+The amount was not so very large; it was, indeed, just about the proper
+amount to take.  One hundred dollars was such a common loss in banking,
+it would not look suspicious.  Anything more would have aroused
+inquiry, while anything less would scarcely have been worth stealing.
+The thing had been well executed; taking one package from the bag and
+tying it up again, then innocently desiring to check the cash next day,
+all showed thought; and it occurred to Nelson that Penton's head was
+just the shape for such thought.  He had not been dragging at his upper
+lip in vain: he had extracted a piece of strategy, which had originated
+in the cerebrum.  There was a peculiar sympathy between Penton's lips
+and his brain, anyway: what the former craved satisfied the latter.
+
+Women are accused of having a monopoly on intuition, but men have a
+corner on "hunches."  From the moment his eyes rested on three parcels
+of silver where there had been four, Evan had a hunch that Penton was
+the thief.  The trickery of it was so in accord with the expression of
+Penton's eye!
+
+"But who has taken it?" said the manager, when the head office letter
+was finished.
+
+"Either you or I," said Evan; "no one else has been here."
+
+Penton grinned.  It mattered not what he did, appearances would remain
+as they were--and that was not against the manager any more than
+against the teller.
+
+"Go home and get a sleep, old man," said Penton; "we may be able to
+think the thing out to-morrow."
+
+The tone of the manager's "old man" rang in Nelson's ears all evening.
+He rebelled against Penton's insinuating manner; like the touch of his
+hand it was coldly, clammily smooth.
+
+In his room the teller sat worrying.  Mrs. Terry called up to him that
+he had a visitor.  Evan asked her to send him up.  It was Henty.
+
+"Here's a letter for you," said the junior; "I didn't see you at the
+post office and thought you would be glad to get this.  The mail was
+just closing when I left."
+
+"Thanks," said Evan.  "Wait till I read it; I want to tell you
+something."
+
+Henty chewed the end of a fat five-cent cigar while Evan read the
+letter, which was from his mother.  It read:
+
+
+"Dear Evan,--We always enjoy getting your letters.  They don't tell us
+much about yourself, to be sure, except that you are well.  That is the
+main thing.  Be sure and keep on your heavy underwear until the end of
+April, and don't wash your hair too often.  I do hope that
+boarding-house of yours is good to you.  I'm making a fruit cake which
+we will express to you in a day or two.  If you could take care of a
+barrel of apples we'd be glad to send one.
+
+"Just think, you have been away from home over two years now.  Dear me,
+it seems like ten.  Lou is still the tantalizer she always was.  Father
+keeps busy and well as usual.  We all look forward to having you back
+at summer holidays.  When do you expect to arrive?  Be sure and let us
+know ahead.  Frankie Arling was in the other day, and asked about you.
+Hoping to hear from you soon.
+
+"MOTHER."
+
+
+Nelson sighed and handed the letter over to Henty.  A. P. blushed as he
+read it.  His red corpuscles had a habit of rushing to the surface,
+like a shoal of small sea-fish, at the slightest disturbance of their
+element.
+
+"I guess a fellow never forgets home," he said, thoughtfully.
+
+"No, I guess not," replied Evan.  "Every morning when I wake I feel as
+if I am somewhere on a visit."
+
+"By gosh," said Henty, "so do I--except that Mrs. Wilson doesn't use me
+much like a welcome visitor.  I always have to break the ice to get
+into my water pitcher."
+
+Nelson did not smile.  In fact, he had not heard: he was thinking of
+the disappointment coming to his mother if he should have to make good
+the one hundred dollars loss and miss his holidays.
+
+"There's trouble down at the office, Henty," he said, slowly.
+
+The genial junior raised his eyes in wonder.
+
+"Drunk again?"
+
+"No," said Evan, "worse than that.  Someone has stolen a hundred
+dollars."
+
+"The dickens!"
+
+Nelson related him the story.  A. P. drank it in with the expression of
+a child listening to Andersen's fairy tales.  And he asked just as
+practical questions as a child asks.
+
+"Do you suspect anybody?"
+
+Evan smiled: he was growing tired of tragedy.
+
+"I sort of suspect Filter," he answered.
+
+Henty was serious.
+
+"You don't like to say, do you?"
+
+"No," said Evan.
+
+The junior was silent a moment, after which he observed, bashfully:
+
+"A certain party certainly needs the coin."
+
+Evan sighed, and Henty looked at him quickly.
+
+"You're lucky it wasn't a thousand, don't you think so?"
+
+The teller had not thought of that.  He was surprised both at the idea
+and the junior.
+
+"You're right, Henty," he said, with interest, "I'm taking an awful
+chance.  I believe in my heart Penton is a crook."
+
+"Surest thing in the world!"
+
+Evan thought a while.
+
+"I'm going to write head office," he said finally, "and ask them for a
+move--but I can't peach on Penton's doings."
+
+An answer to the manager's letter came from head office, but the teller
+did not receive a reply to his own.  The one addressed to Penton said
+that manager and teller would have to put up $50 each, on account of
+the loss, to be paid in monthly instalments.  It was a shrewd
+compromise, and characteristic of head office.
+
+Penton swore volubly and pretended to be sorely aggravated.
+
+"Well," he said, "_you_ got off easy, anyway."
+
+Filter was professionally indignant when he heard of the affair, but a
+man came in who couldn't write his name, and asked to open a savings
+account.  He so interested Gordon that Gordon forgot all else and
+settled in between the covers of his ledger like a pressed moth.  He
+came out of his shell (to change the simile) toward the close of the
+day's work and went into a minute examination of certain deposit slips
+that had gone through the day of the shortage, but his interest was
+purely clerical, and his sympathy amounted to: "Did you ever see such
+rotten writers as these Banfield storekeepers?"
+
+Henty looked up from a sponge, which, he said, he was training to lick
+stamps and envelopes, but did not speak.  Words would have added
+nothing to the humor of his expression.
+
+For two weeks after the affair of the silver, Penton surpassed himself
+in signing his name.  Also he took a social turn, and began once more
+to hypnotize the good people of Banfield.  He had a faculty for
+ingratiating himself with people who were not great students of human
+nature.  The town mayor was a particularly easy victim of his.
+
+"Hello, Mr. Muir," Penton would say as the mayor entered the office,
+"I'm glad to see you looking so well.  How's Mrs. Muir?  I understand
+you are doing big things on the dam."  (Here Henty would emphatically
+repeat the word from his desk in the rear of the office.)  The mayor
+would grin and begin divulging municipal secrets.  Penton always made a
+point of talking loudly with Muir and laughing yet more vociferously at
+his jokes.
+
+There were women in Banfield, too, who were not impervious to Penton's
+flattery.  He had a way of looking into their eyes and speaking softly
+that charmed them.
+
+Nelson knew that Penton could have managed the branch well if he had
+gone to work; Penton was, evidently, familiar with the great circus
+man's aphorism about humbugging people, and could have given them all
+they wanted of it--to the bank's profit.  It was, no doubt, owing to
+this hypocritical asset and the appreciation of it by head office
+officials, that Penton was managing a branch.
+
+There is a certain stock-company actor in the States who periodically
+goes on a spree, comes back and weeps to his audience, and is forgiven.
+That is virtually what Penton was doing.  He had hit upon the scheme as
+by inspiration, and it worked well.  He asked a young dentist and wife
+down to his apartments behind the bank and feted them on the best in
+town.  Above all, he flattered them, and he made Mrs. Penton help him
+do it.  She was, in fact, blind to the greater part of his badness, and
+was so anxious to help him into the favor of Banfield's best customers
+that she was willing to do a little wrong in his behalf.  The surprise
+he perpetrated on her and the town, his new policy of ingratiation,
+gave her hope and made her rather proud of his versatility.  She was
+very agreeable indeed to the dentist and his wife.
+
+In a little town like Banfield good tidings spread just as rapidly as
+bad, among the better souls.  News of the Pentons' hospitality and
+geniality went abroad until many of the ladies of Banfield desired to
+see more of Mrs. Penton, and, incidentally, her husband.  Using the
+dentist's wife as a medium, they secured introductions to Mrs. Penton.
+Soon pink-teas began to be stylish.
+
+It was about a fortnight after the affair of the silver.  Mrs. Penton
+was giving a euchre party (whist was unknown in Banfield, and bridge
+was considered a sin) for the big dogs and ladies of Banfield.  Her
+husband was the biggest dog of the bunch; he had gone so far as to deck
+himself in a dress-suit, and his stiff collar was almost the shape of a
+cuff.
+
+The staff, of course, was invited, and had to go.  Evan would gladly
+have stayed away, but he was afraid of hurting Mrs. Penton's feelings.
+She gave him a special invitation.  He loathed the thought of drinking
+Penton's cocoa and eating his food.  He well knew that the manager had
+counted on getting business--and forgiveness--for every mouthful of his
+miserable provender.  Also, he was quite sure that the cocoa was either
+unpaid for or had been bought out of a mysterious silver package.
+
+The teller played cards, for a while, at the same table as Penton, and
+saw him smirk down upon his guests as no one, surely, but W. W. Penton
+ever smirked.  Evan felt that he would suffocate unless he got away
+from that table.  He wished he could stand on a chair and reveal the
+character of the manager as he knew it--but a smile from Mrs. Penton
+reached him, and he filled with pity for her.  He knew that a
+revelation of Penton's real character would sound as strange to her as
+to any person there.  She knew her husband had "faults," but what does
+that common word signify to a woman in love?  The atmosphere became too
+stifling for Evan.  He felt his head throb and threaten to ache.  He
+excused himself, to take air.
+
+He went out through the office and threw open the front door of the
+bank.  It was a clear April night; the air was cool and fresh.
+
+There were only two living creatures visible on the front street.  One
+was a dog, the other a man carrying a small valise and wearing a
+well-barbered beard.  He was walking toward the bank.
+
+The stranger ascended the steps where Evan stood and spoke in a tenor
+voice:
+
+"Are you Mr. Nelson?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"I'm Inspector Castle."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+_JOYS OF BANKING._
+
+The Banfield teller shivered an instant, but, on sudden thought, braced
+himself and began to say:
+
+"You came in answer to my--"
+
+"I came to inspect the branch," said Castle, quickly, looking Evan in
+the eye as he pushed past him into the office.
+
+The teller's hopes fell.  He thought the inspector was going to take
+him aside and ask him all the particulars of his loss.  He would have
+had to tell them--and he wanted to.  It flashed across his mind that
+had Castle come in answer to his (Evan's) letter, it would have been
+sooner.  Why had the inspector allowed two weeks to elapse?
+
+"Where is Mr. Penton?" asked Mr. Castle, when a light had been turned
+on in the office.
+
+"He's giving a party to-night, sir," said Nelson.
+
+"Is that so?  Well, we won't interrupt it.  You might just ask him to
+come out for a moment and open up.  Where is the rest of the staff?"
+
+"They are in there, too."
+
+"Good; we can set right to work."
+
+Evan took Penton aside and whispered the news.  The manager paled
+slightly and his colorless eyes looked queer; but a flush suddenly
+overspread his face, and he said:
+
+"Couldn't have come at a better time.  We're entertaining the best
+customers in town."
+
+He greeted Castle with an affectation of great friendliness.  It was
+well done.  Penton surely was an artist at deception.
+
+The inspector spoke blandly to him, and politely refused to interrupt
+Mrs. Penton's party.
+
+"Just you open up for us, Mr. Penton," he said, "and go back to
+your--customers!  The staff and myself will get the work started."
+
+Evan was watching not the inspector but the manager.  Penton's eyes
+moved uneasily in their sockets, and he protested:
+
+"Oh, no, they won't miss me.  I'll jump right in with you."
+
+Castle was delving in his bag.
+
+"Well," he said, "I suppose you know them best; but I don't want to
+interfere with--business."
+
+Penton laughed, relieved, at the remark, and hurried into his
+apartments to excuse himself.  The party folk were awed by mention of
+the inspector, and their interest gave Penton an idea: he would
+introduce Castle to them.  The inspector thought the suggestion a good
+one.  Penton whispered him hints about the men whom he would present,
+so that Mr. Castle might know how to dispense his pretty words.  Evan
+listened to those whisperings until they were silent in the hall that
+led to Penton's house, and an uncomfortable feeling crept over him.
+The manager was currying Castle's favor.
+
+Henty and Filter came out to the office before Penton and the inspector.
+
+"What do you know about that!" cried Henty, crimson.
+
+The teller smiled faintly.  Filter's pallid face was glowing in
+anticipation of coming balances.  It was ten o'clock.
+
+To Evan, who knew what a bank inspection meant, this one was
+particularly unwelcome.  Inspections always are, to experienced clerks,
+who have no regard for the novelty of the thing; they mean from one to
+three weeks' work, day and night without let-up.  But the blinding work
+is not the worst of it; the suspense is what unnerves and worries.  A
+fellow never knows what moment he is going to get a figurative
+knock-out from the head office official.  The inspector, if he happens
+to have indigestion or domestic trouble, can be appallingly
+disagreeable.
+
+Henty had never been through the ordeal of an inspection, but he had
+heard about it.  He stood now staring at the teller, comically.
+
+"Gee," he said, "and old Peterson has had one of my drafts out for
+three days.  A sight, too."
+
+Filter was in a dream about the ledger.  Evan was thinking.  He did not
+like Inspector Castle; he felt that he could not expect much of him.
+Still, he determined he would tell his story.  Evan had no very
+definite conception, at the time, of what that story would be; and when
+Castle and Penton went over to the hotel for a drink, before setting to
+work, he wondered whether it would be advisable to speak about the
+silver at all.
+
+Penton stayed close to the inspector, as though unwilling to leave him
+alone with the teller.  Evan saw it plainly, but what could he do?  It
+was not for him to thrust himself on I. Castle, or tell him whom he
+should or should not ignore.  Ignored! that was it!  The $350-man was
+beneath the notice of an inspector.  It occurred to Evan now why head
+office had not answered his letter.  What right had he to write head
+office?  He could not, in this connection, forget the look Castle had
+given him at the bank door, with the words: "I came to inspect the
+branch."
+
+The manager's efforts to please and assist the inspector were both
+pitiful and burlesque, to those who knew his daily habits.  He wedged
+himself into the cage with Castle, handing him parcels of money to
+count, and playing the caddy to perfection.  He lifted a bag of silver,
+and as he did so his bulging eyes rested waveringly on the teller, who
+was watching.  At the same moment Evan heard his name spoken softly
+from the hall.  Mrs. Penton was calling him.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," she whispered, when they stood out of hearing in the
+shadow of the hall, "I want to ask you something."
+
+Her patient face bore a frightened look, her eyes and voice were
+beseeching.
+
+"What is it, Mrs. Penton?" he asked, kindly.
+
+"It's about Pen," she said.  "You'll try to help out, won't you?"
+
+He wondered if she knew about the missing money.  Had Penton told her?
+
+"You mean about--about drink?"
+
+"Yes," she answered, vaguely; "there's nothing--else--is--there?"
+
+No, she did not know about the silver.  Why had Penton not told her?
+It seemed to Evan that she should have known about the loss, especially
+since her husband was putting up half of it.  But he knew she would
+never suspect Penton of stealing, and therefore any reference to the
+shortage would be incomprehensible to her.  If she thought the teller
+suspected her husband she would be heartbroken.  Evan's thoughts flew.
+After all, he had no proof that the manager had taken the silver, and
+before he voiced his suspicion to Mrs. Penton, or head office either,
+he must have proof.
+
+She stood gazing at him, waiting for his promise.  She looked so
+girlish and dependent he forgot danger and only remembered that a
+woman's happiness was at stake.  It gave him a heroic impulse.
+
+"I'll do all I can, Mrs. Penton," he said, quietly.  "Things seem to
+have started off smoothly, and I think everything will be all right."
+
+The young woman was in a party dress and a party humor.  She took
+Evan's hands in her own and pressed them.  "You are a dear," she
+whispered, and fluttered back to her guests.
+
+Evan hated Penton at that moment more, perhaps, than he ever
+had--though not so much as he would hate him.  The young wife's faith
+resolved the teller, however, to watch the manager instead of telling
+head office about his drunkenness.  It was hardly likely Penton would
+get another chance to rob the cash; he was a coward and would be afraid
+to try again.
+
+It surprised the teller to know that Mr. Castle would take a drink,
+particularly with Penton.  Was it a trick of the inspector's?  If it
+was, he would approach the teller before going back to Toronto.  Evan
+would let it rest at that.  He would not take the initiative, both on
+account of Castle's peculiar actions and Mrs. Penton's pleading.
+
+At 2 a.m. Henty swore.  It was a pretty early orgy, but A. P. probably
+felt justified, at that.
+
+"When are they going to ring off?" he asked Nelson.
+
+"I'm going now," said Evan; "my head is splitting."
+
+Penton heard.
+
+"Why didn't you say so before, old man," he said, softly; "we don't
+want our teller to go out of business."
+
+Henty winked at Evan from behind the manager's back, and when Penton
+had eagerly answered a summons from the inspector, whispered:
+
+"What's his game, I wonder?"
+
+"If you stick around, A. P., you may find out."
+
+"By Jove," said Henty, "I will stick--till the cock crows!"
+
+Nelson climbed the hill to his lodging.  He lay in bed an hour before
+sleep came, and then dreams bothered him.  They were nightmares; a
+confusion of figures, money and old associations.  He dreamt that he
+was an inspector and that Penton had taken him out for a drink,
+talking, the while, about swollen deposits, curtailed loans and
+expanding prospects.  There was an unknown and unfortunate clerk mixed
+up in this dream; a queer, vague fellow.
+
+Next morning A. P. left his lodging for work much earlier than usual.
+He called on the teller, whom, for some reason, he desired to escort to
+the office.  Evan was eating breakfast.
+
+"Just up?" asked the junior.
+
+"Yes," interposed Mrs. Terry, "and he should be in his bed.  See how
+tired he looks, Mr. Henty."
+
+Evan laughed.
+
+"Mother would be jealous," he said, "if she knew how well Mrs. Terry
+treated me."
+
+The kind woman smiled, pleased.
+
+"I can't make much headway," she said, coughing, "for what I try to do
+the bank goes and undoes."
+
+"That's true enough," interjected the teller.
+
+"And now this inspection affair is on," continued Mrs. Terry, "I'm
+afraid they'll lay him up."
+
+Henty blushed tremendously, but looked steadily at Mrs. Terry, as he
+said:
+
+"I sure envy your boarder."
+
+Nelson glanced up from a dish of cherries.
+
+"Maybe Mrs. Terry would let us room together here," he smiled.
+
+Henty's eager expression was enough.
+
+"He's welcome," replied Mrs. Terry, and added: "then when they have
+done for my present boarder I'll still have someone."
+
+To the junior's delight he was thus invited to share Evan's room, and
+Mrs. Terry's cooking.  He kept stammering out his thanks until Nelson
+was through eating.
+
+"Let's walk around the block before going to the office," said A. P.
+when they were outside; "I want to tell you what happened last night."
+
+Evan lit a cigarette, probably to fortify his nerves against an
+anticipated shock.
+
+"You weren't gone long," said Henty, "when the manager went over to
+Filter and talked a while in whispers.  Then he came to me and began
+shooting off about my good work and a lot of other rot, gradually
+leading up to what was on his mind, and sort of preparing me for the
+third degree.  'Henty,' he said at last, springing it, 'I suppose you
+know we had a loss around here?  Now I want to ask you something
+confidentially.  You don't think Nelson would take it, do you?'  I
+looked at him and told him he'd better roll over--not exactly in those
+words.  'I don't think he would either,' said Penton.
+
+"When he and the inspector had their heads together inside the vault I
+asked Filter what the manager had been saying to him.  It was exactly
+what he had said to me.  'What's the matter with them?' said Filter;
+that's all.  Some day Filter'll wake up and get enthusiastic about
+something; I think it'll be in the next world, though."
+
+Evan laughed.  It was such a fine spring morning he could not have
+forebodings.  He was not worried by what Henty had told him.
+
+"He's just trying to smooth things over, A. P.," said the teller.
+
+"Do you think so?"
+
+"Sure."
+
+The junior sighed, like one who tells an ostensibly funny story without
+effect.  The teller threw away his cigarette half-smoked.
+
+"I don't feel much like work this morning, A. P.," he said.  "I'd
+rather go out into the woods and tap a tree for sap."
+
+"It's a little late for that, I'm afraid."
+
+"Do you know anything about sugar-making, Henty?"
+
+"You bet; I made sap-troughs all one winter and emptied two hundred of
+them every day in the spring.  You'll have to come down home with me
+sometime."
+
+"Thanks," replied the teller, "I'd like to.  Will you return the visit?"
+
+"Just try me."
+
+When they reached the bank Penton was already there, but the inspector
+was not yet around.
+
+"Well, how are you this morning, Nelson?" asked Penton, in a
+business-like tone.  Henty walked on through to his corner of the
+office.  He never stayed in the neighborhood of W. W. Penton any longer
+than was absolutely necessary.
+
+"All right, thank you," answered the teller, turning to go to work.
+
+Penton framed up a stage mien and spoke in a dramatic or tragic
+whisper.  Evan had no difficulty in seeing through the make-up.
+
+"You don't suppose either Henty or Filter would be capable of taking
+that money you lost, do you?"
+
+The teller laughed sarcastically.  He was angry, and had it on the tip
+of his tongue to say: "You're crazy!" but he thought it better to hold
+his temper.
+
+"Has the inspector been asking you about it?" he said.
+
+"Well--yes," replied Penton; "he said I'd better ask all of you your
+opinions, just as a matter of form.  Not that he suspects anybody; he
+thinks it probable that someone climbed in the window, between five and
+six o'clock that day, and got it."
+
+"Impossible," said Evan; "besides, they would have taken it all."
+
+Penton's unpleasant eyes grew still more unpleasant.
+
+"Good G--, man," he said, "the money's gone, and we've got to account
+for it in some way!"
+
+"We have accounted for it, by putting it up," answered the teller.
+"What good can our speculations do head office?--they're not losing
+anything anyway."
+
+Without further palaver he went to his cage.  He tried to focus on the
+work before him, but his head swam.  He saw pictures of himself and
+Penton in a fight; himself equipped with new grips far superior to the
+toe-hold in point of pain.  He tried to figure out Penton's object in
+asking the questions just asked.  "We've got to account for it,"
+afforded a clue.  That was it: Penton wanted the staff to substantiate
+any ridiculous explanation he should see fit to give the inspector.  He
+interviewed them so that he might be able to put words in their mouths,
+when reporting to Castle.  Evan realized that should he be asked any
+questions by the inspector, he must tell more than would be good for
+Penton.
+
+The day's rush started in the regular market-day fashion.  To begin
+with, several dames brought in an amalgamation of barnyard soil and
+spring ice in their boots and stood over the hot-air grates to thaw.
+That simple act put the clerks in a market-day mood and gave the office
+a market-day "atmosphere."  Then things went spinningly.  The bank and
+the staff became a machine and the parts thereof, as if incited to
+action by the combustion of certain gas-mixtures in the place.
+Especially the teller's head took on the character of a metallic
+organism: he could almost hear the wheels buzzing.  Occasionally a cog
+somewhere grated, as, for instance, when a drover brought in a cheque
+for $500 and had to wait in line behind the wife of a neighbor whom he
+hated, until she got $1.79 for her produce ticket, and had deposited $1
+to the credit of Janet Jorgens in trust for little Harry Jorgens.
+
+It was three o'clock before Evan had a chance to eat lunch.  It lay on
+the little table in his box, dry and sour.  He looked at it with
+enmity, and, snatching a few bites of this and that, which he washed
+down with cold water, threw the remainder in a waste-basket, and went
+back to the dirty money.
+
+Penton was all aglow.  He perambulated up and down the office shouting
+through the wicket at people to whom he had never spoken before.  He
+would run to the ledger, find out the name of a poor innocent farmer
+whose whiskers told of a possible buried treasure somewhere, and bawl
+out that name, to the owner's consternation.
+
+"You've got a busy office here, Penton," said the inspector, just
+before the door was closed.
+
+"Yes, Mr. Castle.  Of course we have no opposition right in the town.
+But I mean to hold it, even though another bank opens up.  I hear the
+N---- Bank is coming in."
+
+"Yes," said Castle.  "By the way," he remarked, addressing the teller's
+back, "wasn't it a market day on which you lost the silver, Mr. Nelson?"
+
+Evan turned around; the two men were leaning against a desk behind the
+cage.
+
+"Yes, sir," was the simple reply.
+
+The inspector nodded, then walked into the manager's office.  Penton
+followed him--but that was nothing unusual.  The boys returned to their
+work.
+
+"First shot!" shouted Filter, who had been working on the current
+ledger balance off and on all day.
+
+Henty stopped licking an envelope, and allowing it to stick to his
+tongue, whispered hoarsely:
+
+"Loud pedal, Gordon; the inspector's in town."
+
+Filter colored.  It must have been quite a relief to his placidly pale
+face; but his eye caught an unextended balance, and he forgot the
+offence immediately.
+
+It was six o'clock before Evan had his cash balanced.  A money parcel
+had come in from Toronto, another had to be sent out, and the cash-book
+had not been able to compare totals until after five.
+
+The inspector and the manager went over to the hotel just before
+supper, and afterwards to the Penton apartments, where Mrs. Penton had
+a spread laid for I. Castle.
+
+Three times during inspection Mr. Castle accepted the same invitation.
+Evan wondered if Mrs. Penton had woven her charms about the inspector;
+he thought it quite likely.  She would do it for her husband's sake.
+Castle, by the way, was a bachelor.  One day he held up a bunch of
+collateral before a head office clerk who was clamoring for permission
+to get married and said:
+
+"Look at that; if I had married I would not have this bunch of
+security."
+
+Evan had given up hoping that Castle would favor him with a private
+interview; in another day the official would be gone, to repeat his
+tortures on some other unsuspecting branch.
+
+"What do you think of it, Gordon?" asked Henty.
+
+"Of what?"
+
+"It, i-t."
+
+"You mean the inspection?"
+
+"Your foot's asleep--sure; did you think I was talking about the
+World's Series?"
+
+"I don't mind the extra work," said Filter; "you see, that's the
+difference between a good man and a bum one."
+
+"Ugh!" said Henty, slapping his own cheek, "Right on the transmitter!"
+He turned toward the teller and suggested a walk around the Banfield
+pond, called a lake.
+
+"It will do you good, Evan," he said.
+
+A few nights' companionship had made the teller and junior chums; had
+accomplished more in that respect than months of office association had
+done.  Henty sometimes called Nelson "Even."  He said he thought the
+nickname was a good one; in the first place it meant a poetic summer
+evening; and in the second place it looked like the masculine gender
+for Eve.  The night Henty enlarged on the probable derivation of his
+friend's name, Nelson laughed Mrs. Terry awake.  It was the time of
+night when anything sounds funny to the one who cannot fall asleep.
+
+Evan liked the big rough-and-ready junior.  He looked like a farm-hand,
+and acted like a young steer; but he was amiable, and had brains, too.
+Above all, he was wholesome.
+
+"I'll be with you in a minute, A. P.," said the teller.
+
+They walked along the lakeside.  Spring had really come.  Crows were
+flying around aimlessly, early robins piped from a willow where the
+"pussy-tails" were budding, and a blackbird with glossy neck chirruped
+unmusically on a stump.
+
+"Don't you ever get the fever to go back on the farm, A. P.?" said Evan.
+
+"This time of year I do.  Dad would like me to do the prodigal.
+Sometimes I feel like going, too."
+
+"Why don't you go?"
+
+Henty licked his lips--a childish habit of his--and asked innocently:
+
+"Straight, Evan, do you think I'll ever make a banker?"
+
+"I don't know; they say a poor clerk often makes a good manager."
+
+"At that rate," laughed Henty, "I ought to make a peach.  Filter says
+I'm on a par with those market-women when it comes to clerking."
+
+Evan smiled, and picking up a stone threw it out into the lake.
+Something in his action interested the junior.
+
+"Darn it," he said, "I don't know why I ever left home.  I could have
+gone through all the colleges in the country if I had wanted to."
+
+"Oh, well," said Nelson, carelessly, "a fellow gets certain experience
+in the bank that college men know nothing about.  They get the baby
+taken out of them.  They have to live in lonesome burgs and make up
+with uninteresting strangers.  I suppose it all helps make a man of
+them."
+
+"Give us a cig," said Henty; then--"Don't forget the girls, either.
+They're a great education."
+
+Nelson was silent: he had graduated from that sort of thing.
+
+"A fellow shouldn't string them, though, Austin," he said, thoughtfully.
+
+To give valuable advice on matters of love one must have experience,
+but to get experience one must suffer and make others suffer;
+consequently, love-advice is undesirable from both experienced and
+inexperienced.  In the first instance it makes the adviser
+inconsistent, and in the second case it is valueless.
+
+"I've made up my mind I'll never trick the dear creatures," said A. P.
+
+"You will if you stay in the bank."
+
+"How's that?"
+
+"Well, for instance, when you leave here, what will become of Miss
+Munn?  You can't marry her till you draw at least one thousand dollars
+a year.  Very soon now head office will be moving you; you'll gradually
+forget Hilda; you'll have to."
+
+The big junior blushed, licked his lips, and sighed, but made no reply.
+For the rest of the walk he seemed sunk in reverie.
+
+Inspection over, Penton walked up and down town where all might see.
+When he appeared in the main office his manner was overbearing.  He
+placed heavier emphasis than ever on his "my's," and flattered the
+mayor to the point of idiocy, and cursed his current account with a vim
+foreign to his old self.
+
+Then gradually he settled into his chair again.  There came a lull in
+office work, and in general business, for the farmers were seeding.
+Penton began to drag at his upper lip.  The film over his eyes
+thickened, and his brooding deepened.
+
+A silent messenger came from Toronto:
+
+
+"Instruct Mr. E. Nelson to report at our King Street office, Toronto,
+at once.
+
+"(Signed) I. CASTLE."
+
+
+The teller was engrossed in work when Penton handed him the letter.  He
+read it dazedly, a moment, then his face glowed with excitement.
+
+"I won't be able to swipe any more silver," he said, facetiously.
+
+The manager did not reply to the levity; he stared out of the window
+and Evan could see his cold hands shiver.
+
+"I'll be sorry to lose you, Nelson," he said, humbly, and walked into
+his house.
+
+Some time later Mrs. Penton came out to bid the teller good-bye.  She
+had been crying; that was the poor woman's chief occupation.
+
+"Are they really moving you away?" she asked.
+
+"Yes, Mrs. Penton, my train goes in a couple of hours."
+
+She held out her hand, and turned away before he had released it.  He
+watched her slight form disappear in the dark hall, and stood gazing
+into the gloom that enwrapped her.
+
+"Say, Ape," said Filter, "will you take me in your room at Terry's?"
+
+"You can have it all," said Henty, holding up a sheet of paper; "here's
+my resignation."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+_SOME WHEEL-COGS COME TOGETHER._
+
+It was the rule in Evan's bank that the branch to which a clerk was
+moved should stand the expense of transportation.  Evan was, therefore,
+obliged to borrow ten dollars from the Banfield branch to buy a railway
+ticket.  There was no account, though, to which the voucher could be
+charged, so the manager agreed to hold a cheque in the cash for a week;
+that would give the transient clerk time to find a lodging in the city
+and to put through his expense voucher on the Toronto office.
+
+"Are you really serious about quitting, Henty?" asked Evan, as they
+stood on the little depot platform.  Filter was back at the office,
+transferring leaves from the ledger to a file.
+
+"You bet," said Henty; "I don't believe I ever would have stuck here if
+you hadn't come along.  That night you hit this dump I was
+down-and-out, but you came across with a line of talk that cheered me
+up.  Honest, Nelson, you're one of the decentest lads I ever met."
+
+Evan's laughter echoed from the woods west of the station.  A few
+Banfield folk scattered around waiting for the daily excitement of
+seeing a train, looked at him askance, as if to say: "What do you
+bankers care about a town?  We see little of you when you're here; and
+you go away with a laugh!"
+
+"But," said Evan, "it will be a month before you can get off."
+
+"That's nothing; I can stand it for four weeks, when I know that I'm
+leaving."
+
+"You speak as though the job really weighed on you."
+
+"It does; I didn't realize it till now."
+
+Up the track the train whistled.
+
+"Well--good-bye, A. P.  I think you're wise to quit."
+
+"Thanks.  Good-bye, old sport."
+
+The color came in a flood to the big junior's face.  There might just
+as well have been a tear in his eye, under the circumstances.  He
+watched the train hurry away, eager to make up for the minute lost in
+Banfield; then turned down the board walk toward the bank, with a sigh.
+
+The hotel Evan found his way to, on arriving in the city, was on King
+Street West.  After checking in his baggage he wandered in some
+direction, and, to his surprise, found himself gazing rube-fashion into
+the very office to which he was assigned.  Half the desks were lighted,
+and clerks still worked on them, although it was past ten o'clock.
+Evan sighed, like a sleeper who is tired out, and walked further on.
+The first cross-street he came to was brilliantly lighted; its life and
+gaiety had an effect upon him.  He thought there were a great many
+people going about.  He dropped into a picture-show for over half an
+hour, and when he came out the theatre crowds were pouring into the
+street.  Then he thought the city must be a delightful place to live
+in.  What a bunch of pretty faces!
+
+About eleven o'clock he worked his way back toward the hotel.  He
+watched for the bank and found it still full of spectral activity.  It
+occurred to him that city life must be made up of pleasure and work,
+without any rest.  He was to find that largely the case.
+
+Wondering what post he would be asked to fill in the main city branch
+of his bank, the Banfield teller fell asleep.  There is, however, a
+somnolence unworthy of the name of sleep.  Such was Evan's
+unconsciousness.  It may have been that he had a more sensitive
+temperament than most bankboys, but, at any rate, it is a fact that
+whenever anything out of the ordinary occurred in his life of routine
+he was cursed with sleeplessness.  Dreams had a liking for him, the
+kind of dreams that incline to acrobatic feats and magic
+transformations.  He dreamt, this night as he tossed about, that he and
+Henty were driving a herd of cattle up King Street, trying to steer
+them toward the bank, where it was desirable to corral them, when
+suddenly the kine raised up on their hind legs and became human beings,
+many of them with charming faces.
+
+As a result of his hallucinations he was burdened with yawning next
+morning.  After a light breakfast he set out for the bank, arriving
+there at half past eight.  Several of the clerks were working.  He
+rapped on the door, and the janitor, who was dusting, let him in.
+
+"I'm a new man here," he said.
+
+"Another victim, eh?"
+
+Evan smiled.  Apparently the place had a reputation.
+
+"What's your name?" asked the bank's man.
+
+"Nelson."
+
+"Hey," called the janitor, "come here, Bill.  Here's a new pal."
+
+The individual named "Bill" slouched up the office.
+
+"Well, for heaven's sake!" cried Evan.  "I thought you were dead."
+
+Bill Watson shook his old desk-mate's hand heartily, and wove
+undictionaried words into his speech.
+
+"Where have you been, Evan?"
+
+"Why, don't you know?  I've been teller and accountant at Banfield."
+
+Watson smiled.
+
+"One of those three-entry-a-day places?"
+
+"No, sir; I worked nights more than half the time."
+
+Bill grunted.
+
+"This business is getting to be a son-of-a-gun, Evan.  Even in country
+towns the boys are being nailed down to it.  The bank keeps cutting
+down its staff, or otherwise losing them, and crowding more and more
+work on the boys who stick."
+
+Evan was silent for a while.  Bill's familiar voice carried him back to
+Mt. Alban, and he could see the office as it looked the day he began
+banking.  He could, moreover, see the faces of Julia Watersea and Hazel
+Morton.
+
+"Have you heard from the old town lately, Bill?"
+
+"No, not for a year.  I left there soon after you did.  They sent me to
+Montreal, then here.  I got a few letters from Hazel when she was
+there."
+
+"Is she gone from the Mount?"
+
+"Yes, d---- the bank and poverty!"
+
+Watson's eyes fired and he spoke passionately.  For the moment Evan's
+presence had brought back Mt. Alban days too vividly.  The color
+gradually died from Bill's face.
+
+"I'm a jackdaw, Nelsy," he said, trying to smile.  "Do you remember how
+I used to carry on up there?  I had a rotten time in Mt. Alban, but it
+was the best time I ever had.  I wish to the good Lord I could do
+something besides banking.  But my salary is now $750, and I'm
+twenty-three; I couldn't draw the same money at anything else, and
+stand any chance of promotion.  No mercantile house, for instance,
+wants a man of twenty-three.  What's a fellow to do?"
+
+Unable to answer the question, Evan gazed out of the window at throngs
+of men and girls on their way to business.
+
+"Just look at that mob," said Bill; "lots of them are working on about
+one-half what they're worth, and they've been years getting in where
+they are.  Take the young men you see, they've been specializing for
+years, some of them, and draw about fifteen dollars a week now--just
+what I do.  Their chances are away ahead of mine, as a rule, because
+some day they'll be salesmen or managers or something--and they're in
+very little danger of being fired.  Do you think for a minute I could
+step out of here into their boots and get fifteen dollars.  No, sir."
+
+"Why stick to clerical work then?" asked Evan, repeating a question
+that had often been ineffectively put to him.
+
+"What else can I do?"
+
+Evan opened his mouth to advise, but closed it again in thought; and
+the longer he thought the more thoughtful he became.  Bill was right,
+what could he do?  He might dig drains, but where would that lead him?
+Downward, certainly.  Still, there must be positions in so large a city
+as Toronto, for men who could fill them.  He expressed himself to that
+effect.
+
+"The trouble is to find them," said Bill.  "When a fellow works from
+eight in the morning until ten or eleven at night, and usually on
+Sunday, what chance has he to look around?  I'm never out of here till
+six o'clock, at the earliest.  You can't run across a job through the
+night, you know.  We don't even get out for lunch."
+
+"You don't!"
+
+"No; we eat those ten-cent stomach-aches handed around in carts.
+Occasionally we get a cockroach, to relieve the monotony; but not
+often.  Usually it's just common flies.  Sometimes I have such pains in
+my interior I have to double up on a stool and pray for relief."
+
+Evan smiled wanly.  Bill was a reckless talker, but he generally
+managed to say something sensible every two or three sentences.
+
+"How about stenography, Bill?"
+
+"That's all right for a fellow of eighteen or nineteen, Evan, who can
+afford to start in at ten dollars a week.  But when a fellow of
+twenty-three applies for a job like that they think there is something
+wrong with him, and some kid of seventeen, fresh from business college,
+steps in ahead of him....  By the way, why don't _you_ quit?"
+
+Evan looked toward the street again.
+
+"I haven't had time to think about it lately.  I thought, when they
+moved me here, that something would turn up in the city.  That's one
+reason why I was so glad to come."
+
+"Well, don't fool yourself," said Watson.  "Your work in Banfield will
+look like kindergarten when you're here a week.  And don't have any
+idle dreams about studying shorthand and typewriting at night; you'll
+kill yourself if you try it.  It isn't possible where fellows work like
+they have to in a city bank.  I imagine they'll shove you on the cash
+book, where I am now.  If they do, good night!"
+
+"Is it written like the town cash book?" asked Evan, turning his
+attention, from habit, to the work before him.
+
+It is singular how soon a bankboy learns to give work or the discussion
+of work precedence of everything else.  He will go out on the verandah
+at a party, with some of his confreres, and discuss banking until he
+forgets the prettiest girl at the dance.  He loves to flirt with his
+work at a distance; at close range it fascinates but does not charm.
+
+Watson laughed briefly.
+
+"The general idea is the same," he said; "but there are a hundred
+extras.  It's the details of the city cash book, and of all other city
+routine, that get your goat.  It's not so much the quality of the work
+as the quantity that eats you up.  Believe me, kid, you're never done."
+
+Realization only comes with contact.  Watson led the new man back to
+the cash-book desk, and proceeded to give him an outline of the work.
+Evan's vision swayed.  At first he was unable to formulate an
+intelligent question.  When he began asking Bill said, apologetically:
+
+"Sorry, kid, I'm not balanced yet.  You'll have to take another lesson
+again.  Maybe they won't put you on this post after all.  No use of
+wasting good energy till you have to."
+
+Therewith Bill grappled with his big red-backed book, and looked
+neither to the right hand nor to the left.
+
+Toward nine o'clock the boys began coming into the office in
+instalments.  As they passed Nelson, who was leaning against a desk,
+some of them nodded, recognizing a comrade, but most of them passed by
+with merely a glance.  Men were coming and going every week.
+
+Evan had speculated on the sensation he would make as he--a real, live
+pro-accountant--walked into the city office.  Where was the sensation
+now?  Within himself.  He experienced an involuntary chill; the
+machinery of which he constituted a cog was beginning to grind.  He
+should not have been so susceptible to those petty influences that
+impregnate a new environment; but he was below normal health by reason
+of work and worry endured at Banfield, and inclined to look on the dark
+side.  Instead of going to work in a city bank he should have taken a
+trip to the country and engaged with a farmer to plant onions or
+shingle a barn.
+
+At the front of the office there were two desks.  Evan asked one of the
+juniors, of which there were three, who occupied these desks.
+
+"The accountant and assistant-accountant," was the answer.
+
+Branch men were familiar with the signature of the Toronto accountant,
+for he always signed the letters; but not with his assistant.
+
+"What's the assistant-accountant's name?" asked Evan.
+
+"Castle," said one of the boys; "Mr. Alfred Castle."
+
+Toronto was destined to be a nest of surprises for the Banfield clerk;
+he might as well begin getting used to them.
+
+"Do I report to the manager?" he asked Watson.
+
+"No," said Bill, "the manager won't know you till you're here a month
+or so.  You report to Alfy."
+
+"You didn't tell me _he_ was here," said Evan.
+
+"Didn't I?  Well, it wasn't very important anyway.  I forgot you ever
+knew Castle.  I'd like to forget him myself.  Without kidding, Nelson,
+he is the best imitation of a sissy I ever saw.  He has a pull, though,
+and it almost makes him brave, sometimes.  I don't say anything to him
+any more--he'd have me fired, and I need the little fifteen dollars per
+week, minus guarantee premiums."
+
+Bill had wasted a minute, so he cut off short and delved into the cash
+book once more, muttering curses on the third teller, who was out in
+the additions of his teller's cash book.
+
+Castle entered the bank about 9.15.  He wore a light tweed suit, a
+light felt hat, tan gloves, tan shoes, and a black necktie stuck with a
+pearl pin.  The juniors, who had been indulging in an early row over
+the condition of the copying rags, sobered down when Castle's narrow
+form glided through the inner door.
+
+Evan, who had been watching for him, went toward him easily, and held
+out his hand.
+
+"Well, Nelson," said Castle, without offering to shake hands, "you'll
+go on the cash book."
+
+Evan lingered a moment, expecting to be asked a personal question, even
+if it were a careless one; but Alfred dived into his mail and did not
+pause as he added: "Watson will break you in."
+
+"And if ever I get the chance," thought Evan, "I'll break you in."
+
+With that and other hostile reflections he turned and walked to the
+rear of the office.
+
+"Bill," he said, "I'm to go on your job.  What do you suppose they'll
+do with you?"
+
+Watson looked at him comically.
+
+"Never worry about the other fellow," he said; "not here.  It's each
+man for himself in a city office and God help the hindermost.  Don't
+forget that, Evan, or you'll be imposed on right and left.  Now, come
+here and get a bird's-eye view of your new friend.  You'll find him a
+nasty brute to handle; he rears, bites, bucks and balks.  The time you
+think he is going to take you over the river he turns tail, and you hit
+a balance about 1 a.m.  You not only have to balance your friend the
+cash book, you've got four tellers to balance, and they have everything
+beat for bulls.  Our old friend 'the porter' wasn't in it for a minute
+with these mutts here."
+
+"Are you ready?" shouted a resonant voice.
+
+"Yes," said Bill.  "Mr. Key, meet Mr. Nelson, from Banfield.  Now,
+Nelsy, beat it to the basement till we get through calling.  You'll
+need a cigarette to fix you up for the day's work."
+
+"Yes," said Key, "take all the constitutionals you can get;" then in a
+loud voice: "Credit clearing house--come on, come on!"
+
+Away they went, while Evan stood by in hope of learning something.  He
+lost the trend of things looking at Key's white hair and faded face.
+He wondered how many years the little man had been a bankclerk.
+Besides Key there was another clerk with grey hair.
+
+"Who's that?" Nelson asked the oldest and most talkative junior.
+
+"Mr. Willis.  He was a manager once, but head office didn't like his
+policy, so they cut his salary down from $2,400 to $1,400 and sent him
+here to this sweat-shop to finish it out."
+
+"To finish what out?"
+
+"Why, his career.  Some career, eh?"
+
+Evan suddenly remembered that he was a country accountant, and it was
+poor policy to abet a junior in heterodoxy.
+
+"He must have done something wrong, didn't he?"
+
+The junior, a sharp youngster, looked extremely indignant now.
+
+"No chance," he said; "Willis is one of the decentest heads around this
+dump.  He made no bulls: it was a pure question of policy.  Ask
+anybody.  The collection man over there" (pointing to a red-haired
+fellow of about thirty) "used to work with him.  I brought Johns in the
+bills before three o'clock last fourth of the month and he opened his
+heart to me.  Johns is my pal around here, although he never sees me
+outside the office."
+
+"You seem to like him pretty well," said Evan, smiling.
+
+"I do.  I let the other kids have Castle's work; when that guy travels
+east I always go west."
+
+Seeing how nihilistic and iconoclastic the young chap was, Evan deemed
+it unwise to longer remain in his society; he wandered across to the
+"C" desk.  There, two men were ruling up large books in preparation for
+the morning's clearing.  They were standing with their faces to the
+light and working with indelible pencils.  That job always affected
+their eyes, Evan was told, after a few weeks or months.
+
+The clearing came in.  The paying teller shouted for the fourth teller.
+The latter was in the basement--but not for long.  Two "C" men had him
+by the collar and were bringing him up the cellar steps in jumps.
+
+"We're sick of late clearings," said Marks, the "husky guy with the
+small ankles," as he was called.
+
+"Any more of this monkey-doodle business," rejoined Cantel, "and we'll
+distribute you around the coal basement."
+
+"Aw, shut up," growled the fourth teller; "you'd think your clearing
+amounted to something."
+
+Ten minutes later the two current-account ledger-keepers were howling
+for "more stuff."  They looked like a couple of hungry wolves, and kept
+up their yowling as persistently as those wild rovers.
+
+"See here," bawled Marks, "you guys got to wait till we get it.  What
+in ---- do you think we are--jugglers or magicians?  It's rather hard
+to balance it, you know, Brower, till we get it out of the envelopes.
+Get me?"
+
+"No, but I will get you," retorted Brower, "if you don't grease that
+adding machine."
+
+Cantel grinned, and kicked his desk-mate, Marks.
+
+"Say, Ankles," he said, "we'll get him in the basement at noon and I'll
+suggest gloves, eh?"
+
+He with the tapering figure made no reply; he was chasing nine cents up
+and down a long adding-machine strip.
+
+"They must have a brilliant bunch over at the S----," he said, grinding
+his teeth; "I never knew one of their slips to balance."
+
+Key had done so much checking in his day he looked upon the calling of
+the cash book as a morning recreation.  The rest of the day he had
+little time to talk, so he got a large number of stray sentences into
+the totals that made up the cash book.
+
+"Debit nine eighty-five drafts issued," he called--"tell Banfield to
+come over here--get it?--credit head office branch account six hundred
+even--how long has he been here?--I called that once--exchange on money
+orders fifteen cents--Well, Mr.--er--No!  I said fifteen.  What's the
+matter with you, Watson, were you drunk again last night?"
+
+And so on.  Key suggested to Nelson that he wander around the office
+during the forenoon and get a general idea of the way things were done.
+"You'll find it a new business altogether from country banking," he
+said, not very much to the new man's encouragement.
+
+Following Key's advice Evan endeavored to learn a few generalities.
+About the only thing he learned, however, was that every man had a post
+that kept him busy every minute, and did not want to be interrupted.
+One grouchy chap looked at the Banfield man and said:
+
+"Say, Nibs, the bank doesn't pay us to instruct greenhorns; it only
+pays us to get through this dope you see here, and half pay at that."
+
+Evan was offended; one of Henty's blushes came to his cheeks.
+
+"I don't think anything you could teach a fellow would be worth much
+anyway," he replied; and the teller next door stopped in the middle of
+a heavy deposit of putrid money to laugh and remark:
+
+"Strike one for Banfield."
+
+It seemed to Evan that he was going through
+
+juniorship days again.  Nobody appeared to have any respect for him.
+Still, as far as that was concerned, nobody had any respect for
+anybody.  He consoled himself with this observation.
+
+What was called "noon hour" came anywhere between noon and three
+o'clock.  The tellers bolted their portion of food with monied hands,
+stopping between bites to serve a customer.  The ledger-keepers ate
+with their backs to the wicket, turning around nervously every time
+anyone rustled a slip of paper or made sounds like a pass-book on the
+ledge.  The "C" men and one or two others were privileged to eat in the
+basement, but when one was balanced another wasn't, and as a balance
+aided digestion and the man ahead had not the time to wait for the one
+behind, they usually ate alone.  Sometimes, by particularly good
+management, several of the boys got together for five minutes below and
+scuffled; but the fun was short-lived.
+
+Evan ate his hand-out on an old lounge in the furnace-room.  It was for
+all the world like a prison cell.  Outside, the city was bright and
+wonderful; in the dark, chill office and gloomier cellar there was but
+one factor, one idea--Work.
+
+The Banfield teller felt singularly alone in that basement, eating a
+cheese sandwich.  The boys were so engrossed in their own affairs they
+had no time for welcoming new men.  Aside from the two ledger-keepers
+and the two "C" men, the boys were almost strangers to each other.  The
+Banfield man would have to learn, like the others, to affiliate with a
+book.  He wondered, as he sat in the basement alone, how long it would
+take him.  He speculated on the hit Filter would make in that soulless,
+endless city-office swirl.
+
+The morning had been confusing to the new man, but the afternoon was
+chaotic.  He stood beside Watson, trying to get the multitudinous
+cash-book entries through his head, until he was played out.  He yawned
+repeatedly and his head pained ominously.  Two and a half years of
+office work were telling on him, although he scarcely realized to what
+extent, and but for a very fortunate circumstance--which seemed to Evan
+an extremely unfortunate one--he would have experienced a nervous
+breakdown before long.  But more about that circumstance later.
+
+The bank door closed at three o'clock.  Many people have an idea that
+work inside a bank ceases at that hour.  That is one of the many
+delusions cherished respecting the business, one of the harmless
+delusions.  After three o'clock, especially in a city office, the real
+strain begins.  Tellers must balance their cash, and, on salaries
+varying from $600 to $1,200 (often less than the former, but not so
+often more than the latter) make good any loss sustained through the
+day.  Every balance is a nervous shock and drains away its share of the
+clerk's vitality; if the chance of personal loss is hidden away in his
+balance, the strain is that much the worse.
+
+In the din that followed closing, Evan thought his head would burst.
+The boys lighted their pipes and cigarettes, threw off their coats, and
+commenced the scramble.  Curses and complaints came from every quarter.
+The place was a madhouse.
+
+Even up in the accountant's department there was loud talking.  Evan
+was up there looking for the draft register when he heard the
+accountant say:
+
+"It's got to be stopped.  If you think we're going to stand for this
+sort of thing you're badly mistaken."
+
+The man to whom V. W. Charon was speaking trembled slightly, not from
+fear of the accountant but under the influence of alcohol.  He lifted
+his weary, glassy eyes to reply, but his lips moved inaudibly and he
+stared at Evan.
+
+"This has happened twice in the last month," continued Charon, sharply.
+
+"Three times," corrected Castle.
+
+The broad-shouldered figure paid no attention to anyone but Evan.  He
+staggered past the accountants and held out his hand to the new man.
+
+"Sorry to--s-see you here," he stammered.
+
+Evan grasped the hand of his old manager, Sam Robb.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+_THE MACHINERY GRINDS._
+
+Castle turned his head and sneered, just as he used to do in Mt. Alban.
+
+"You must come up and s-see me," said Robb.
+
+"I will," replied Evan.
+
+Watson came along for the draft register, winked at Robb, and returned
+to his desk, followed by Nelson.
+
+"Is Mr. Robb one of the clerks here, Bill?"
+
+"Yes--liability ledger.  I had it on my mind to-day to tell you, but
+you were not around when I remembered what it was that bothered me.
+Sam's been here several months.  They took his job away from him
+because of letters Alfy wrote."
+
+Nelson could hardly believe it.
+
+"The calf," he muttered.  "What does Robb think about it?"
+
+"Oh, he doesn't say much.  He works like a nigger, all but about two
+days a month--when he goes on a tear.  Been hitting the can a lot
+lately."
+
+"I don't wonder," said Evan; "what has he to live for?"
+
+He had something, though, as every man has--his self-respect.  But one
+sometimes loses that when others do not attribute it to him.
+
+Evan had never felt more incompetent than when Watson asked him to take
+out a balance.  He could just as easily have "taken out" a degree at
+the Toronto University.  While he fretted his still pounding head, Bill
+rode the round-up of registers, supplementaries and totals.  Long drawn
+out exclamations reverberated in whatever corner of the office he
+happened to be searching.
+
+"Teller's book," he shouted behind the paying teller; "come on, Sid."
+
+The poor teller was short in his cash.  Bundles were piled almost to
+the top of the cage; he snatched them up one by one and ran through
+them.  He had a sore hand, too; it had been poisoned by infectious
+money.  Two weeks later, when the teller had returned from sick-leave,
+head office refused to pay his doctor's bill, insinuating that the
+poison might be something else!
+
+"Get out of here, you wolf," yelled the teller; "you're more ----
+bother than ----"
+
+"I'm sorry for you, old kid," interrupted Watson, laughing; "give us
+your book, I'll add it up and maybe find your difference."
+
+Sid Levison hesitated, picked his book up quietly, and faced Watson
+with:
+
+"You're a yard wide, Bill.  I wish we had more of you around here.  I
+got in $50,000 in parcels this afternoon and Charon wouldn't send any
+relief.  Gee, but I'm tired, and my hand pains infernally."
+
+He yawned so widely his glasses fell off.  Relieved of them, his face
+looked peaked and his eyes inflamed and weary.
+
+"Meet Mr. Nelson from Banfield, Mr. Levison."
+
+"How are you?" said the teller, offering his hand; "used to work there
+myself, years ago."
+
+Then he turned to his money.
+
+"How long has he been in the bank?" Evan asked Watson.
+
+"About ten or twelve years, I think."
+
+"He should be a manager by now."
+
+"Sure," said Bill, "I could handle an easy chair myself for that
+matter.  There are at least ten clerks in this office who could manage
+a branch, but everybody can't have one, you know.  Managerships are
+sugar-plums to be handed out carefully by head office."
+
+"I see," said the new man.  "But," he added, "the banks claim they are
+very hard up for managers."
+
+"That's because the job isn't up to much when you do get it; a good
+many fellows get out when they find what they're up against.  A lot of
+this talk about the great opportunities of banking originates in head
+office and is peddled around the country for a purpose.  The bank has
+the greatest advertising system in the country and the least expensive.
+It carries the biggest bluff on earth.  The bank's on a par with
+political flag-wavers when it comes to handing the people the bunco."
+
+About five o'clock Mr. Willis, the old general-ledger clerk and
+ex-manager, edged over toward the cash book, with his hat on and a pipe
+in his mouth.
+
+"Well, Watson," he said, lighting a match, "how's your successor coming
+along?"  The match was burning down, but Willis held it tantalizingly
+away from the pipe while he added: "Why don't you introduce him?"
+
+While the match threatened to burn the old clerk's fingers he slowly
+greeted Evan, and puffing a last flickering flame into his bowl, in a
+way that showed how closely he had, during years of smoking, studied
+the science of combustion, asked:
+
+"How do you think you are going to like city work, Mr. Nelson?"
+
+"It doesn't look very good to me," said Evan.  "I'm off color to-day;
+my head is bursting."
+
+"Why don't you go home?"
+
+"Yes, go on," said Bill; "I didn't know you were all in.  You certainly
+don't look any too frisky."
+
+"I may be on the job alone to-morrow, though," replied Nelson, "and
+just yet I don't know the first thing about it."
+
+Neither Willis nor Watson advised him against the wisdom of learning
+things when he had a chance, so he stayed.  No doubt they knew how it
+felt to be up against a new post in the middle of a day, with everyone
+too busy to lend a hand, or even a suggestion.  The perspiration that
+has been lost under those circumstances would make quite a stream.
+
+Bill had a bad balance.  He worked till ten o'clock, taking half an
+hour off to eat supper.  Evan stuck to it, too.  When he got to his
+hotel he had nervous indigestion and a violent headache.  He took
+quinine and went to bed, more or less disgusted with life.  When the
+drug began to work and the pain of his head was soothed, a peaceful
+lethargy crept over him, and he wished that he might lie in such repose
+forever.  He dreaded thought of the days to come, for he had had a
+glimpse of sedentary slavery.
+
+"Oh, pshaw!" he murmured, and ebbed out into Dreamland.
+
+The next morning he awakened late, and did not wait for breakfast.  He
+was the last man to work.
+
+"We begin operations here at nine, Nelson," said Castle, as the new man
+walked past him.
+
+Evan stopped and looked back, but said nothing.  He was not in a humor
+to explain his semi-sickness to one like Alfred Castle.
+
+"We were waiting for you," said Key; "jump in, old man."
+
+Although he had little idea where he should jump, Evan plunged, like a
+reckless diver, and fought his way through the previous day's work as
+best he could.  Bill took advantage of a strip of smooth sailing to
+steal away and have a smoke in the basement.  Soon Key found Evan
+hesitating over the work, and hollered impatiently:
+
+"Hang that man Watson, where is he?"
+
+Stimulated by the slang Evan made a great effort to qualify.  Key
+noticed his earnestness, and softened.
+
+"I beg pardon, old chap," he said, "you'll be all right in a few days."
+
+Thereafter they were good friends.  Whenever Evan wanted to know
+anything he went to the little grey-haired discount clerk and had it
+explained.
+
+The day after his off-day Robb was on duty, working away silently and
+morosely.  During the slight hill that marked the noon-hour he walked
+back to the cash-book desk to see Evan.  His coming was welcome, for
+the third teller had just dumped twenty-odd sterling draft requisitions
+into the cash-book dish.
+
+"Heavens!" said Robb, "they certainly load you down with work, Nelson.
+Have you eaten lunch yet?"
+
+"No, I forgot to buy one when the kid was in."  He didn't say he had
+also missed breakfast.
+
+"Send out and get something," said Robb; "I'll make out these drafts
+for you.  This isn't work for the cash book, anyway.  I don't see why
+in ---- they want to kill a man."
+
+Robb's face was grey.  He ground his teeth as he ripped the first draft
+from the pad.  As he worked he talked to Evan, who was swallowing dry
+slices of bread with mustard and stray ligaments of gristle sandwiched
+between.
+
+"Nelson," he said, "how would you like to come up and room with me?"
+
+Evan's eyes opened with interest.
+
+"Fine," he replied, "if it wouldn't cost too much."
+
+"How much salary do you draw?"
+
+"Three fifty."
+
+Robb turned and gazed at his young friend.
+
+"By G--!" he cried, "that's a crime.  I hope when I die that they send
+me where I can see the torment of bank officials!"
+
+The elder man's face was paler.  The alcohol was not yet entirely out
+of his system.  He trembled slightly after delivering so vehement a
+remark.  Evan knew then--or thought he knew--how deeply Robb hated the
+bank.
+
+"What would board cost me up there, Mr. Robb?" he asked.
+
+The ex-manager thought for a moment.
+
+"I pay seven dollars," he said, "but I can get you in for a month on
+about four, I think.  By that time you will have found another place."
+
+"That will suit me," said Evan; "I'll still have three dollars a week
+to live on."
+
+Robb's lip curled, and he made a blot over an "i" instead of a dot; but
+he offered no comment.
+
+"Come up for supper to-night," he invited, "and I'll show you the room.
+You might as well move right in, and make a couple of days' hotel
+expenses out of the bank."
+
+Hurrying through the ordeal called "lunch," in order to let Robb back
+to his liability, Evan took the Sterling book and figured out exchange.
+
+"Where did you learn that?" asked Robb, watching him do the first draft.
+
+"Watson showed me last night," replied Evan; "we never issued them in
+the country."
+
+"And they're giving you seven dollars a week.  Do you know what this
+post is worth, Evan?  Fifteen hundred dollars a year!"
+
+The figure dazed Evan.  He could not conceive of his being worth such a
+fabulous amount to any corporation.
+
+"It's just as difficult as my job," continued Robb.  "There's no
+difference between one post and another--except in the amount of work
+done, of energy wasted.  It's all a matter of getting into a rut and
+plugging along there, like a plowman.  A fellow needs certain
+qualifications like accuracy, speed, and a rhinoceros' constitution;
+but what is there to it, from the standpoint of prospects?
+Nothing--except work.  I began in this very office twenty-five years
+ago.  In two years I was almost as capable of handling the liability as
+I am now.  All I needed was a little practice.  I'm just where I
+started.  I've been going round in a circle.  That's banking!  Do you
+think for a holy minute that if I was young again I'd give myself
+another twenty-five-year sentence?  Great Heaven! what wouldn't I give
+to be back at your age?  You may flatter yourself with the notion that
+you're going to have something nice handed to you some day.  Well,
+you'll get it handed to you, all right, but not in a silver salver.
+You'll get it where the chicken got the a-x-e; you'll get it with the
+bank guillotine.  You're now doing thirty dollars worth of work each
+week at a salary of seven dollars.  What guarantee have you that the
+bank will ever change its policy toward you?  If they tie a can on you
+to-day, it will be a tin pail to-morrow and a milk-can the next day.
+Haven't they done it to me, to Willis, to Key, to Levison and a hundred
+others?  My boy, they don't give a fig for you."
+
+So saying, Sam Robb humped his big shoulders and slouched up to his
+desk, there to bury his head in a gigantic ledger for the balance of
+the day.
+
+Evan was troubled.  He still believed that Robb was exaggerating; had
+not the ex-manager brought upon himself most of his failure?  Evan had
+heard that pet charge made against disgruntled clerks, and it came to
+his mind automatically.  Still, he had evidence of Robb's faithfulness
+both at Mt. Alban and here in the city branch, and--he was troubled.
+
+To Evan's surprise, mail from the north brought the cheque Penton had
+promised to hold in the cash for a week.  Not having checked out of his
+hotel yet, he had not submitted an expense account to Toronto office,
+and consequently had no funds.
+
+The accountant brought the cheque to Nelson.
+
+"Don't you know that floating cheques is against the rules?" he said,
+menacingly.
+
+"Yes, sir, but Mr. Penton promised to hold it for me.  Besides--"
+
+"That makes no difference," returned Charon, impatiently, "this sort of
+thing has got to stop."
+
+Evan tried to get a word in, but the accountant, declaring he had no
+time for parleying, turned away with: "We'll hold it over till
+to-morrow."
+
+Had Penton tried to get the ex-teller "in bad" by sending the cheque so
+soon?  It would, thought Nelson, be perfectly in harmony with the
+Banfield manager's knavery.  Probably Henty had quit, suddenly; and,
+angered, Penton had sought revenge on Henty's old associate.  However,
+there was no harm done, thought Evan; and he dismissed the matter from
+his mind--the cash book was load enough.
+
+The cash book was, in fact, more than enough of a load, at first.  On
+the second day of Evan's city experience, about six o'clock, Robb came
+around and asked him how he was progressing.
+
+"I'm all balled up," was the answer.
+
+Robb grinned.
+
+"Never mind," he said, "come on up to the house and I'll help you out
+after supper.  Never work--especially on a cash book--when you need
+nourishment."
+
+Unwillingly postponing work, Evan followed his old manager.  He said he
+knew Robb's boarding-house would suit him, so he went over to the hotel
+and ordered his luggage sent up.  Robb went with him; and, finding a
+mistake of one dollar in the hotel bill, called the clerk down without
+blinking.  Evan thought he would like to be able to do that.  He was
+going to learn the art away out in Saskatchewan.
+
+Robb's lodging suited his young friend perfectly.  It was quite
+central, just a nice walk from the bank.  After dinner the two of them
+sat in the living-room, smoking.
+
+"This is going to feel like home to me," said Evan.  "I don't see how
+they can put up board like this for four dollars."
+
+"Well, it will only last a month," replied Robb, and whispered: "Don't
+tell anybody you're getting it so cheap; that's a secret between us and
+Mrs. Greig."
+
+"All right," Nelson promised.
+
+Mrs. Greig played on the piano, at Robb's request, after the other
+boarders had dispersed.  She was a young widow, good-looking and
+clever.  Robb seemed to like her.
+
+Before long Evan showed signs of restlessness.
+
+"I'll go on down, Mr. Robb," he said, "you can come later, if you wish."
+
+Robb consented.  Mrs. Greig's music seemed more suited to a man of
+forty-two than to one of nineteen, anyway.  But the elder clerk was not
+long in putting in an appearance at the bank.  He found the cash-book
+man in a state of siege.  Evan was, in fact, hemmed in on all sides by
+warlike figures, obstinate and invincible.
+
+Several clerks were working at "night jobs." They looked sideways at
+Robb and Nelson working with their heads together over at the cash-book
+desk.
+
+"Sam's taken a notion to Banfield, I guess," said Marks, who was still
+out in the morning's clearing.
+
+"You boneheaded mutt!" cried Cantel, glaring at his desk-mate.
+
+"What's the matter with you--did you ever see an ex-manager come back
+to help the cash-book before?  Next time we have to tick off we'll
+press him into our service."
+
+"Get wise," returned Cantel, "or I'll press your mitts into service.
+Do you see that?"
+
+He held up a cheque, which at first glance looked like $3.74.  Its
+resemblance to that amount had caused all the trouble: the cheque was
+for $37.40.
+
+"Every cent of our difference!" exclaimed Marks.  "By heck, let's all
+go out and celebrate."
+
+Accepting his suggestion as an invitation, the other "C" man, a junior,
+and a "supplementary" man banged their books shut and accompanied Marks
+to the nearest hotel.  "Celebrating" is a favorite pastime of bankboys.
+Every balance found, every inspection finished, almost anything
+accomplished, requires a celebration.  It is easy to get in the swim,
+and then one makes a fish of himself.
+
+Sam Robb, the ex-manager, was almost as much at sea over the cash-book
+as Nelson was; but he had been a clerk longer than the young man, and
+he plodded ahead methodically, without that nervous anxiety that gets
+young clerks "up in the air."  Robb's frequent remarks rendered the
+strain less intense to Evan; he worked with greater freedom and
+assurance than he would have done alone.  Between them they struck a
+balance within a reasonable time, and locking up the vault went out to
+the street.
+
+The lights of Yonge Street, the city environment, the pleasant April
+air, all revived Evan's spirits.  For a while he forgot that he was a
+bankclerk living in danger of concussion of the brain.
+
+"Let's take in a picture show," he suggested, with interest.
+
+Robb smiled, and agreed.  They entered a picture house called "The
+Rand," in the middle of a film (who ever entered at any other time?).
+It was one of a popular series of crooked clerk pictures then going the
+rounds; one of those in which some fellow robs the till and somebody
+else gets the blame: a woman comes on the screen, snatches her heart
+out of the villain's hands, and throws herself on the hero's neck.
+
+"I wonder if those things ever really happen," said Evan, when they
+were on the street again.
+
+"Sure," said Robb.  "There isn't anything that can't happen--to a
+clerk."
+
+Evan laughed.  He was now chumming with his old manager; why not be
+more familiar and confiding?
+
+"You don't think much of a clerical job, do you?" he ventured.
+
+Robb regarded him seriously and with a certain amount of satisfaction.
+
+"No, Evan," he replied, "I do not.  I've seen too much of this
+dependent life.  That's what a clerk's life is--dependent.  He never
+knows the day or the hour when the axe will fall.  Besides being in
+constant suspense, he is in danger of actually losing his job, any day.
+Now, life is too short to spend in dread of losing a position.  If I
+were a young man again I would build on a solid foundation.  As it is
+all I know is the bank.  It would keep me guessing, after all these
+years of banking, to make my present salary anywhere else; and yet I'm
+not sure, at that, that I will always remain in the business."
+
+They were walking up University Avenue.
+
+"I'm awfully glad to get staying with you," said Evan, suddenly.  "I
+believe I would have had a renewal of homesickness down in that hotel."
+
+"It's a pleasure for me to have you, old man," returned Robb.  "That
+homesickness you speak of is bad, while it lasts.  It doesn't last
+long, though.  When you come to my time of life and realize that you
+have had a different kind of lonesomeness for years and years, you'll
+begin to think ordinary homesickness wasn't in it."
+
+The ice was broken: Evan asked a question he had long wanted to ask:
+
+"Why didn't you ever marry, Mr. Robb?"
+
+The old bankclerk showed neither annoyance nor surprise.  One does not
+mind being asked a frank personal question out of friendship.
+
+"It was like this," said Robb, unhesitatingly, "I couldn't afford it
+until I was thirty.  I mean to say, the bank wouldn't let me afford it
+till then.  The girl was from my home town, down in Quebec.  We wrote
+to each other for two or three years, but I got discouraged and quit.
+I figured that it wasn't fair to spoil her chances; it isn't right for
+a man to do it.  There were lots of men as good as I that she could
+care for, and what right had I to ask her to wait until she was on the
+shelf?  It happened she married a bank man after all, but he was one of
+those guys with a pull; he drew two hundred dollar increases and that
+sort of thing.  Well, when a fellow gives up in the love-game he
+usually begins to booze or do something just as danged foolish.
+Although I might have known she could not wait for me, still it hurt to
+have her marry somebody else--especially a bank man--and it took me
+years to get over it.  And," he seemed to breathe the memory of it away
+in a sigh, "you'll find scores and scores of men in the bank in my fix
+exactly."[1]
+
+Robb's reference to drink reminded Evan that he had not told him about
+Penton and the Banfield trouble.  Why not tell him?  As they sat before
+a grate fire he related the tale of the silver, of Penton's strange
+actions, and of the inspection.
+
+"Take it from me," said Robb, when the story was finished, "you're a
+dead one in the bank's eyes from now on.  To-morrow the increases come
+out.  Just watch yourself get a lemon.  Penton has blackballed you to
+Castle.  Why couldn't it have been Inspector Ward?--he's a good head.
+I'll bet they give you a measly fifty to-morrow, Evan."
+
+"In that case I'd be justified in quitting the bank, wouldn't I?"
+
+Robb snorted.
+
+"If you don't quit, increase or no increase, you're crazy.  If I get
+you a job somewhere else in town, will you leave the bank?"
+
+"Perhaps," said Evan; "but I'm low in energy now, you know, and I doubt
+if I would make much of a hit with a strange man on a new line of work."
+
+"If you're feeling like that you'd better go on a farm for the summer
+and get your feet on solid earth."
+
+The following morning Nelson put in his expense account covering cost
+of moving from Banfield to Toronto.  He did not charge the bank with
+three days at a hotel, as he might have done.  They might be unfair to
+him, but at least he would be honest with them.  Robb saw the debit
+slip among the charges vouchers lying in the cash-book dish.  He walked
+over to the cash-book man.
+
+"You're hopeless, Evan," he said.  "You deserve to be fired."
+
+"What's the matter?" asked Key, who was always nosing around in his
+good-natured way, trying to find things out and dig clerks out.
+
+Robb told him about the expense voucher.
+
+"God bless the bank," said Key; "it seems to have a faculty for picking
+honest boys.  I wish a few professional crooks or gunmen would slip one
+over on them occasionally."
+
+Evan smiled and began to say something, when Castle came sailing along
+and cried, in his high voice:
+
+"It's pretty near time, Nelson, that you knew how to draw a sterling
+draft.  I don't want to have to cross one of these again."
+
+One draft out of fourteen had escaped being red-inked.  It was that
+gigantic omission that brought Castle back from the front of the
+office.  He loved to show authority.
+
+Robb and Key looked at one another, the assistant accountant gone, then
+burst out laughing simultaneously.  Evan joined them.
+
+"There you are," said Robb, turning to the cash-book man; "that's the
+kind of things the bank soaks you for.  They've got a pick against you,
+Nelson.  I have a hunch you and I'll be left out on the increases."
+
+The ex-manager's hunch was not quite strong enough.  Evan received an
+increase of $50, bringing his salary up to $400 per year, less
+guarantee premiums.  Robb was cut down from $1,400 to $1,250, "until he
+manifested a willingness to accept what head office considered to his
+interests."
+
+Robb had refused, for personal reasons, to accept an appointment to a
+place of ostracism, and that, along with the ill-will of the accountant
+and assistant-accountant of Toronto, was sufficient, in the eyes of
+head office, to justify the cutting down of his salary $150.  It had
+been reduced $750 when he was first sent to Toronto--after more than
+twenty years' faithful service.
+
+Sam Robb, that night at dinner, looked like a man who had been through
+a severe illness.  He ate little.
+
+"They want me to resign, Evan," he said gutturally, "or they wouldn't
+have chopped me again.  A nice way of squeezing a fellow out, eh?"
+
+"What are you going to do about it?" asked Evan.
+
+"Get drunk," said Robb.
+
+He did, too.
+
+
+
+[1] The writer of this book took statistics in Toronto among eight of
+the leading banks in the summer of 1912, and found that out of 450
+clerks 13.1 per cent. were over thirty, and 13.0 per cent. were
+married.  Among those 450 bankclerks at least, a man had to be thirty
+before he could afford marriage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+_POKER AND PREACHING._
+
+A night or two after "Sam's souse," as the staff called it, four of the
+boys came back to the office and found Evan working, as usual, on the
+cash-book.
+
+"Still at it?" asked Levison, the paying teller.
+
+"Just struck a balance," replied Nelson.
+
+"Good," said the teller, "we want another man to take a hand in poker.
+Come up when you're through."
+
+"I don't know how to play," said Evan.
+
+"You'll soon learn."
+
+"I don't think I want to learn."
+
+Sid grinned and Brower, the ledgerman, called:
+
+"Aw, Nelsy, be a sport; we need some of this outside money."
+
+The boys laughed in chorus and trooped through the office in the
+direction of the back stairway.  There were rooms for juniors above the
+bank, and one of these was the party's destination.
+
+"We'll look for you, kid," whispered Marks in passing the cash-book
+desk.
+
+Nelson did not reply.  He did not like to refuse the boys; besides, he
+was curious to know just how they acted in a game of poker, and he
+wanted a little cheap diversion.  When his cash-book was ruled up for
+the following day he locked the vault, and saying to himself that he
+would just have a look-in for sociability's sake, went upstairs.
+
+The four players were seated at a round table on which were five heaps
+of matches, one in the centre of the table and one at the elbow of each
+man.  Evan sneaked in quietly and had learned something about poker
+before he was noticed.  Several mysteries, including that attaching to
+the name "pot," had been solved in his mind before Levison felt the
+presence of an intruder and turned around with:
+
+"Hello, Nelsy, come right in.  Did you bring a little of that outside
+money?"
+
+Evan smiled.
+
+"I don't even know how to spell money," he said.
+
+"All the more reason why you should take a hand," chimed in Brower.  "I
+was broke the night before last, and now I've got three dollars and
+seventy-five cents, and am specializing in velvet."
+
+"What's velvet?" asked Evan.
+
+"This here," said three of the boys together, indicating reserve heaps
+of matches.
+
+"And how much does each match stand for?" continued Nelson.
+
+"We're playing penny," answered Levison, "with a nickel limit.  That
+means fairly small losses for each man and a pretty good clean-up for
+the winner, with five playing."
+
+"Have you been only two nights making three dollars and six bits?" Evan
+asked Brower.
+
+"Yes," was the reply, "that's more than I can make in two days in the
+bank."
+
+"Of course," observed Marks, "when you get a bean for a day's work you
+make it out of the bank, but this night-pay comes out of us.  A slight
+difference, to use the words of a--"
+
+"Come on," interrupted Brower, "ante and get the game a-going again."
+
+"Sure," said Levison, turning away from the cash-book man.
+
+Evan was coaxed no further, but stayed behind the boys and watched
+their plays.  By and by he asked the teller about certain cards.
+
+"Just a minute and I'll show you," said Sid.  "Raise you five--pay
+me--ace high!"
+
+"By Jupiter," grumbled Marks, "my heap looks like the Farmers Bank
+clearing."
+
+"See," smiled the teller, while the others enjoyed Marks' ill-luck
+rather than his joke, "I made enough that time to retrieve half an
+hour's losses."
+
+Evan looked across at the C man.
+
+"How about Marks, though?" he asked, half-seriously.
+
+"Don't worry about muh," cried Marks, "I see a 'straight' coming this
+time."
+
+The C man laughed so hard and colored so quickly on seeing his hand
+that the other boys gaped at him and played carefully.  He finally
+bluffed them out with a pair.
+
+In the laughter and uproar that followed, Evan was studious.  He had
+seen through the play, of course; but the excitement rather than the
+humor of it appealed to him.  Here, he said within himself, was
+entertainment, company and economy combined.  None of the boys were
+losing much, could lose much, and the pleasure they took out of it was
+surprising.  Still, Evan was not fond of the idea of taking the
+smallest sum from his companions.  He knew how hard they worked for it.
+
+"Well, what about it?" asked the teller, suddenly, looking up at Nelson.
+
+"I'm afraid I'd clean up on you fellows if I started," said Evan.  "I
+think I'd be tempted to hand back my winnings at the end of each game."
+
+Marks laughed and the others smiled.
+
+"Don't consider us," said Brower, "if you want to play and pay for the
+fun you get, go to it; that's all we're in it for--just the sport."
+
+"But it's gambling," protested Evan.
+
+"So is going to the Island," observed Levison.  "Maybe you'll have a
+good time and maybe you won't, but you pay your money just the same."
+
+The sophisticated argument amused Evan, and helped him believe the boys
+were in their moderate little game only for amusement, cheap amusement.
+They could not afford to take girls out often or even go out alone, so
+they had invented an economic substitute for out-door pleasure.  They
+were trying to take him in with them in their penny-saving pursuit and
+he wondered if their company were not worth the mental effort it cost
+him to surrender certain ideas about playing cards for money.  In this
+state of mind he watched the game proceed.
+
+For half an hour longer he stood behind their chairs, studying hands
+and trying to figure out the percentage of chance against each man.  At
+the end of the time he was surprised to see all their reserves just
+about even, as they had been at first.  Levison saw him intent upon the
+game.
+
+"You see, Nelsy," he said, expectorating the stub of a cigar, "it's
+fair to every man.  Occasionally somebody has a run of luck, like
+Brower had last night, and it's worth losing a little to see that
+happen; but usually we end up pretty much as we started."
+
+"Except me," said Marks; "I just borrowed these chips from Cantel."
+
+Until now Cantel had been silent, bent on earning the price of two
+theatre tickets for the coming Saturday night; but Marks' words roused
+him.
+
+"Don't believe it," he said.  "In the first place I never have chips to
+lend, and in the second place I wouldn't take a chance on this guy.  I
+don't mind holding two deuces, but two I.O.U.'s of Marks' are too many
+for my job."
+
+"Shut up and decorate," growled Brower, who, Evan immediately
+discovered, was the unhappy possessor of the four, five, six and seven
+of diamonds and the eight of clubs.
+
+Marks tried a bluff and Levison called it.
+
+"You're too industrious," cried the other C man "this bunch
+relinquishes its Angora only once a night."
+
+Evan laughed, and felt his fingers itch for a draw.  Instead of asking
+for a hand, though, he took a letter from his pocket and wrote on the
+back of it something for memorization.  Then he told the boys he had
+not yet eaten supper, and they excused him with good-natured remarks.
+After indulging in a sandwich, a small bowl of rice-custard, and two
+slices of brown bread, he went up to the boarding-house.  As Robb was
+not in, he was obliged to entertain himself.  He hit on the form of
+entertainment uppermost in his mind--cards.  He took the memorandum he
+had written above the bank, and dealing out a poker hand to four
+imaginary players and himself, proceeded to create flushes and other
+combinations.  He was unfair in his playing, however, as he looked at
+each man's hand and selected cards from it instead of the pack.  In
+this way he managed to deal himself a royal flush three times in fifty
+minutes.  The exercise was tiring, though, and he leaned back in his
+chair.  In that restful attitude a lethargy came upon him, and he
+day-dreamed about poker.
+
+It was a game of science and chance, but were not all other games also
+dependent upon science and chance--even to a game of ball?  There was
+something in what Levison had said: in going to the Island one did buy
+the _chance_ of having a good time.  And as to the selfishness of the
+game, did not the boys want him to join them?  If they were going to
+lose by having him with them it was not likely they would invite him.
+As far as his own possible losses were concerned, Evan had seen enough
+to feel sure he would break about even.  Thus he would have all the fun
+for nothing, and would be one among the other fellows.  Being without
+the money to participate much in a city's recreation, he welcomed the
+opportunity of getting something for nothing, which it seemed he would
+do in an odd game of poker at one penny ante.
+
+The strain of daily work was severe; one could not think of spending
+the evenings with a book--that was too much like more work.  What one
+needed was something with many laughs, a few cigarettes, and the
+company of other bankclerks.  But where did bankclerks, on salaries
+varying from $300 to $800, congregate?  At clubs?  In the drawing-rooms
+of society?  Under the white lights of theatre facades?  No--in a
+shabby, lonely room somewhere, where a nickel looked like two bits.
+That was where one must go to be among them, and to be one among them
+he must buy, with his spare pennies, the chances of pleasure they
+bought.
+
+Evan's dreaming was bringing him near the dividing-line between sense
+and nonsense.  But what, O Employer of Labor, determined the trend of
+his dreams?  If he had been able to take an occasional trip up to
+Hometon, only three hours' journey, would he have lain awake nights
+devising means of filling up the dreary evenings?  If he had even been
+able to take a friend out to the theatre occasionally, those cool
+spring nights, without borrowing the money, would penny poker have so
+interested him?  But you will not listen, Mr. Employer.  You say: "If
+we raise him $200 instead of $100, _he will only spend it anyway_!"  If
+your Maker had given you one hand instead of two, because of the
+possibility of your doing more harm with two than one, would you not
+doubt His wisdom, to say nothing of justice or mercy?  What if the
+bankclerk does spend all he makes--who made _you_ his guardian?  You
+are his employer, not his father or mother.  If he can earn $1,000 a
+year after three years' service (and in the _Star Weekly_, Toronto,
+summer of 1912, a Canadian Bank official declared that a bankclerk was
+no good unless he could) what right have you to give him only $500 or
+$600?
+
+Evan dreamed of amusing himself, until sleep came; sleep, almost the
+only inexpensive and valuable amusement some people get.  Next morning
+he awakened in a sporting frame of mind, and went to work somewhat
+buoyant for having strangled an awkward scruple.
+
+"Are you going to play again to-night?" he asked the paying-teller.
+
+"Sure," said Levison, "but we've got five already.  Bill Watson is
+coming.  I don't think the fellows care for a six-handed game."
+
+Evan did not notice the smile on Sid's face.  He went back to his
+cash-book with the intention of coaxing his way into the evening's
+game.  By and by Brower came along from the accountant's desk.
+
+"Say, Nelsy," he whispered over the cash-book, "Marks got a sure tip
+from the races through his uncle to-day, and we're all going in on it.
+It's all right, believe me.  He gave us one at the last races and we
+all made a five to one clean-up.  This is a ten to one, sure.  If
+you've got a dollar to throw away give it to Marks."
+
+"I haven't got any to throw away," replied Nelson, annoyed that on top
+of his recent surrender to poker someone should try to coax him into
+playing the races.
+
+"Oh, very well," laughed the ledgerman, "no harm done."
+
+Evan made a sudden resolution that he not only would not bet with them
+that day but that he would pass up the poker game that night: it would
+show them that he had a mind of his own, even though he did want to be
+sociable.  However, late in the afternoon he began to wonder what he
+would do in the evening.  He almost wished the cash book would not
+balance before nine or ten o'clock.
+
+Nevertheless, and strange to relate, about six o'clock the big
+red-backed book did balance.  No one was around to hear Evan exclaim:
+"A first shot!"
+
+He was washing his hands at the tap when a key turned in the front door
+and Cantel came running in.
+
+"Hurrah!  Hurrah!" he shouted, "we're all rich."
+
+Evan asked him if he had gone crazy.
+
+"No," replied Cantel, "but Levison has.  He bet ten dollars and cleaned
+up a hundred.  The rest of us made from ten to thirty.  Here, Nelsy,
+here's your ten bucks."
+
+The cash-book man laughed ironically.
+
+"You certainly have gone nutty," he said, wiping his hands on the
+towel.  "I didn't bet anything."
+
+"Listen here," said Cantel, "this is the dollar I owed you.  Brower
+told me you wouldn't bet, and we were so danged sure of cleaning up
+that I decided to place your bet myself.  I made twenty on my own
+account."
+
+Evan was struck with the sporting generosity of his fellow clerk, but
+could only decline the money.
+
+"That's going too far, Cant," he said.
+
+Cantel began to swear and continued swearing until several other clerks
+had clattered down through the office, whooping and laughing.  Watson
+was almost fizzing with gin and lemon.  Levison, too, walked with a
+slant.  They gathered around Nelson, telling him what a good cash-book
+man he was and what a fool for not getting in on some of their "outside
+money."
+
+"I'll tell you what I'll do," said Evan at last, "I'll take the dollar
+out that Cantel owes me and stake you the other nine on a poker game,
+providing you do not ask me to play."
+
+"You f-foolish f-fellow," stammered Watson.
+
+"Wh-what's s'matter?" asked Sid, thickly, "weren't you asking s'morning
+about a game?"
+
+"I want to see how it's done once more before playing," parried Evan,
+who was in reality beginning to hanker after the game.  It would, he
+figured, be almost as much fun looking on as playing--one night longer,
+anyway.
+
+Upstairs in the little room five reserves and a pot stood before
+Nelson's eyes.  The boys had been playing half an hour.  Levison, drunk
+and reckless because of the day's winnings, bluffed out three jacks
+with a pair of kings and laughed until he nearly choked.  Watson, too,
+played recklessly, but was singularly lucky.  After three successful
+plays Bill exclaimed:
+
+"Let's raise the limit; I'm sick of this monotony."
+
+"I'm game," laughed Levison.
+
+"Naw!" cried Cantel, who had been losing.
+
+"Come on, be a sport," said Brower and Marks in different phrasing.
+
+"Not for mine," replied Cantel; "I quit the game.  Maybe Nelsy will sit
+in a few hands."
+
+"Sure he will," said Marks, "there's class to him.  He's a sport or he
+never would have thrown away nine bucks on millionaires like us.  Come
+on, Nelson, get in the game."
+
+"Yes, come on," coaxed Levison, in syllables impossible to write, "and
+if you lose too much we'll give you back something from the pot.  It's
+only for fun--we want your company."
+
+Without taking into consideration the raising of the limit, for the
+reason that he knew he would not need to bet, and figuring that he
+could play merely for the fun of it a while at penny losses, Evan gave
+in at length.
+
+"Well, I'll try it," he said, ashamed of his stubbornness, "just for
+sport."
+
+As luck would have it he raked in a few pots right on the start; then
+came odd losses and another succession of gains.  His success seemed to
+please rather than tease the other boys, and, to repay them for their
+consideration, Evan decided it was up to him to make a few bets.  He
+played rather recklessly after a couple of good winnings, saying to
+himself that the game was going to be short-lived; and his recklessness
+brought him luck.
+
+How the time flew!  Evan looked at his watch and could not believe his
+eyes--it was ten minutes to ten.  He mentioned the fact to the boys.
+
+"By Jove!" exclaimed Watson, "I must go down and have a swig before the
+bars close.  Come on, Sid."
+
+In a few minutes the two tipplers returned with what Bill declared to
+be a "full house"--three bottles of beer and two flasks of whiskey.
+Evan was sorry to see the stuff brought in and told them so.
+
+"Now don't be too hard on us, Nelsy," pleaded Watson, in a drunkenly
+comical tone, "we won't ask you to drink."
+
+"No, shir-ee," said Sid, "Nelz all right.  Good sport."
+
+Flattered in spite of himself, his blood warming up, Evan played on,
+and tolerated the drinks.  Toward the close of the game he proceeded
+carefully, however, not that he intended to keep the money he had
+gained and use it for clothes or board, but that he might hold it over
+for other nights and prolong this newly-found form of amusement!  He
+swore to himself, and told the boys, that when the money he had gained
+was spent he would not play any more, because he was beginning to see
+that some of the fellows might lose more than their salaries could
+afford.  This was a special night, and they didn't notice it much, but
+as a precedent, and so forth, excuses and arguments _ad infinitum_.
+
+Evan might have been able to stop after losing the sum he had gained,
+and he might not.  Some bankboys had turned away from the exciting
+pastimes of the majority, to find what pleasure they could in walking
+the streets and patronizing the picture shows, but whether Evan would
+have been able to do it or not is not for this story to decide.  He was
+not destined to remain in the bank, to suffer through the years its
+impositions; he was not going to be saddled with the responsibility of
+choosing between hopeless monotony and a life of blind recklessness.
+That miserable lot was for others, whom Nelson would some day assist in
+throwing off the yoke.
+
+Sid Levison, now thirty years of age and drawing $1,100 a year, had
+made resolutions like Evan's, believing himself to be stronger than
+circumstances.  He had started off in the bank with just as high ideals
+as Nelson's, and with a sweetheart just as true as Frankie; but years
+of disappointment had crushed both his hopes and his ideals, until now
+he lived for the petty and illusive pleasures of the moment; drink,
+gambling, and other demoralizing "recreations."
+
+Sid Levison, and other bankclerks like him, were abandoned to a life of
+waste because they had never been given a fair chance.  Had they been
+honestly paid for service in the early years of their banking life they
+might have spent, at first, all of their salary and done considerable
+mischief to themselves and others, but when they came out of their
+youthful nightmare the future would not have been blank and
+lustreless--as it often is to Sid Levisons, as matters stand.  They
+open their eyes for a moment to the impossibilities of their situation,
+and close them again with a sigh or an oath, hating the light of common
+day, so cold and blinding in comparison with the witching glow of
+midnight flame.
+
+Bill Watson and those other young poker-players were following in the
+way of their paying-teller, innocently, naturally.  Every day they are
+following in that way, and the bank is perfectly willing that they
+should.  Does not a man become dependent upon the bank in proportion as
+he loses his own self-dependence, and in proportion as a man is
+dependent upon his employer is he not subject to the whims of that
+employer?
+
+The public often wonders about bankclerks, and about other office-men,
+too, in fact.  Why don't they settle down at a reasonable age and do
+their part toward building up a nation?  Young men in their teens are
+expected to be silly, but when a man of thirty is still a waster he
+becomes an enigma.
+
+"What's the matter?" people ask; "where lies the origin of the trouble?"
+
+"In human nature," the capitalist answers.  That is the answer that
+pleases and excuses him.  But is it true and sufficient?
+
+Those whom fortune has favored may, until the day of doom, invent
+sophisms to veil their selfishness, but they cannot get rid of the
+obligations resting upon them--without discharging them.
+
+When those obligations are ignored injustice is wrought, and oftimes
+the result is crime.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+_FIRED._
+
+The month with Robb was nearly up, and Evan was beginning to look for
+another lodging.  He had a suspicion that his old friend was putting
+himself out by entertaining another at four dollars a week.  He knew it
+would be useless to mention the matter to Robb; he decided that the
+only thing for him to do was to vacate, then watch his chance to serve
+the ex-manager a good turn some day.  He really believed Robb was
+paying Mrs. Greig extra on account of the accommodation.
+
+As they sat, now, talking over trivialities, Evan told his friend that
+he had found a new boarding-house, which, of course, he had not.  The
+ex-manager drew a breath deep enough to be a sigh.
+
+"I guess it's better, Evan," he said, thoughtfully; "but I hate to see
+you go.  Not only because I will miss your company, but I would like to
+knock the bank-bug out of your head.  That was one reason why I wanted
+you here in the first place.  I haven't been lucky in turning you up a
+job anywhere else just yet, but I'm going to get one for you, and going
+to hold you to your promise."
+
+"If you can show me," answered Nelson, "where I'll be better off, it's
+me for the new job."
+
+The small increase had not affected Evan seriously.
+
+"I've been showing you all along that you couldn't be worse off than
+you are, haven't I?" said Robb.
+
+Evan was not sure; he had had no business experience outside of the
+bank; naturally the only job he had ever had looked good to him.
+
+The day after the increases Sam Robb had been off duty again; but the
+accountant had said nothing, considering, perhaps, that the Mt. Alban
+ex-manager had been "called" substantially enough in the reduction of
+his salary.
+
+Robb had been quiet since his latest rebuke, and since the drunk
+following it had not been absent from duty a single day.  All the same,
+he had been drinking steadily, quietly.  Nelson often felt like doing
+something about it; he had no idea what.  Always when the impulse came
+to him he closed his half-opened lips, leaned back in his chair, and
+kept his troubled thoughts to himself.
+
+May was past her prime.  The "Island" was becoming more popular every
+night, and the Sunday crowds at Scarboro grew rapidly.  Robb and Evan
+walked down University Avenue to the bank.
+
+"Well, we'll have a rest to-morrow," said Robb.  "I'm getting to be an
+old man, and as long as I remember we've celebrated the 24th."
+
+"I guess we always will remember Queen Victoria," replied Evan, "but
+I'm going to work tomorrow.  Jack has to transfer his ledger, and I
+promised to help him."
+
+Robb looked daggers at a robin.
+
+"There you are," he said, in a soft, ominous tone; "that's the bank.
+They give a fellow a post that keeps him going night and day, Sundays
+and holidays, knowing that if he gets up against it absolutely, some
+other mark will chip in and help him out.  They get the greatest
+possible labor out of the least possible staff at the lowest possible
+figure."
+
+Evan smiled, and repeated another bank chestnut handed down from time
+immemorial among the staff as a valuable exotic intended to satisfy the
+ambitions of those who had them:
+
+"That's supposed to be good business, isn't it--economy?"
+
+"Economy be hanged!" said Robb, "and good business be ----!  Good
+business, my dear boy, is giving reasonable value.  Whether you are a
+farmer, a merchant, an employe or an employer, good business consists
+in delivering the goods, or paying cost of delivery, as the case may
+be.  One of the most valuable articles on earth is Labor, and when a
+man buys it a decent price should be paid.  The Bible is a wise old
+book; doesn't it say that 'the laborer is worthy of his hire'?"
+
+Robb spat against the curbing and went on.
+
+"Do you know why banks build so many fine structures throughout the
+country, and how it is they can afford to purchase the best locations
+in all the cities?"
+
+"I have often wondered," said Evan, meekly.
+
+"I'll tell you: it's because of dividends that can't be declared.  The
+banks' profits are so high they couldn't begin to share them in
+dividends; the public wouldn't stand for it.  So they buy property,
+build buildings, and pile up capital.  At the same time they are
+starving their clerks."
+
+"But," said Evan, feeling obliged to stand up for the institution that
+gave him employment, whether that employment was respectably paid for
+or not, "isn't it up to the clerk?  If he is willing to work for a
+certain salary the bank isn't going to throw money at him."
+
+Robb, to Evan's surprise, laughed heartily, then sneered.
+
+"My dear Boob," he said, "they've got you by the whiskers all
+right.....  Now look here: the bank hangs a great big bluff from
+beginning to end.  It tells juniors they _will be_ well paid after a
+while--as soon as they are experienced.  But it doesn't fulfil that
+promise.  When the junior becomes a senior he is told that he _would
+have_ succeeded if he had done certain things.  Isn't that what they
+told me?"
+
+They were at the bank.  The day before a holiday is no time for
+distracting thoughts.  Evan went in and concentrated on his work, and
+Robb on his.  The conversation they had had must come up for future
+consideration.  That is the way with bankclerk "consideration": it is
+always future.
+
+Four weeks had made Evan fairly familiar with the ways of a city
+office.  On the cash book he had a good opportunity to see the workings
+of the entire system, for the cash book is a concentration of all
+business; it is an itemized general ledger.  Evan was rushed from
+morning till night, and worked many a night.  Yet he did not find that
+in the routine which satisfied his intellect.  He knew himself to be a
+machine; not a creative machine--there is no such thing--but a
+reconstructive instrument.  He was a meat-grinder, a fanning-mill,
+after that a phonograph--nothing more.  Yet, from sheer physical and
+superficially mental activity he was, in a measure, satisfied with his
+lot.  He derived satisfaction from a comparison of his working ability
+with that of other clerks.  He should have compared himself with a star
+in the sky instead of a knot-hole in the fence.  There is a ridiculous,
+childish satisfaction in measuring one's self by an inferior, or even a
+peer.  It is an ignoble source of content.  But, aside from flattering
+himself into a species of content, in that way, Evan sated his natural
+ambitions in continuous work.  The laborer is reconciled to his place
+because he really gets something done, though it be to another's
+benefit almost entirely: Evan knew he could not work so hard without
+accomplishing something.  He did accomplish something--for the bank.
+
+Evan Nelson was wearing himself out, body and brain, for much less than
+a living wage.  The experience he got was no longer of value to him;
+every day's work was a repetition of the previous day's work.  He had
+no time for study or advancement of any sort.  For what then was he
+working?--the salary.  Evan did not realize it, but, he worked night
+and day for that seven or eight dollars per week.  It was all he got,
+therefore it alone must have been his reward.  And year after year in
+the bank, it would be the same way.  If the business did not keep faith
+with him, if it did not reward him according to his works, in 1907,
+would it do so in 1908 or 1912?  No; it would keep up its policy of
+delusion and perpetuate for ever and ever its vain promises.  Then,
+some day, it could, with impunity, turn on him and break him.
+
+"Good morning, Nelson," said Key, coming to call; "what time did you
+get balanced last night?"
+
+"I had a first shot," replied Nelson.
+
+"Hooray!" cried Key.
+
+"At ten o'clock," added Evan, grinning.  "I couldn't get things rounded
+up for a trial till then."
+
+"Oh," said Key, rubbing his chin.  "They ought to give you some return
+work....  How are you feeling these days?"
+
+"Just average," answered Evan; "I had to cut out the cigarettes.  I
+never smoked more than three or four a day at the most, but I find that
+I have fewer headaches when I leave them alone."
+
+"Fewer headaches," repeated Key, in his peculiar way.
+
+Evan smiled, and dived into the calling, drawing the time-worn battered
+old Key in with him.  After a while the little man said:
+
+"I suppose you count those headaches part of the game."
+
+"Yes," and another chestnut rolled to the floor, "every business has
+its drawbacks."
+
+"And every horse has its hold-backs," said Key, wondering whether it
+would sound like a joke or a child-speech.  When it seemed to be lost
+on Evan, he corrected: "I meant 'every jackass.'"
+
+"I see," returned the cash-bookman, "you think I'm a jackass for
+letting the bank hold me back."
+
+"Yep!"
+
+"So does Mr. Robb."
+
+Key rested his blue pencil on an amount and looked across at Evan.
+
+"You think we're soreheads, don't you, Nelson?  Maybe we are.  But let
+me ask you something.  Supposing you had worked twenty years in the
+bank, and then they gave you, with great show, a little branch down in
+New Brunswick; supposing you went there and found that the bank had
+practically no business because it wouldn't oblige the community, and
+you started to lend money on good security, believing that a bank
+should be an asset to, not a leech on, the country.  Supposing you
+suddenly had the branch taken away from you, because you tried to make
+it, and were making it, a benefit to the community--and were sent back
+to a sweat-shop on reduced pay: then supposing a bright young fellow
+came into the branch with the dreams you used to dream yourself, when a
+boy--tell me, wouldn't you try to make him understand what a fool he
+was?"
+
+For answer Evan asked a question:
+
+"Is that what they did to you?"
+
+"Yes, and that's what they've done to dozens of managers.  Every other
+bank has done the same thing to some of its old stand-bys."
+
+"Well," said Evan, "don't they do the same thing in other lines of
+business, in corporations and so on?"
+
+"I hope not," replied Key, tearing a voucher with his pencil; "but even
+if they do that doesn't excuse the banks.  I suppose all trusts pull
+off arbitrary stunts, but the bank trust is the only one I happen to
+have personal experience in."
+
+"A fellow simply has to trust to luck, I suppose," replied Evan.  "Some
+fellows seem to get along well enough in the bank."
+
+Key grunted.
+
+"There are two kinds that eventually get the best that the bank
+has--that's little enough: First, the willies with a pull, and second,
+the sissies who siss.  The fellow with originality and get-up is choked
+off, sooner or later.  He usually manages to offend head office early
+in his career, and the rest of his bank life is--like mine!  There are
+occasional lucky ones, as you say; but personally I'm not very strong
+for charms and stars.  A fellow who has nothing stronger than luck to
+bank on may make a good race-track tout or fortune heeler, but not a
+business man.  Don't work for any corporation or at any job where
+you're, so far as the position itself is concerned, dispensable; unless
+you are necessary to your employer, whether he be a magnate or an acre
+of land, jump the job."
+
+Castle was passing.
+
+"Key," he said, in his falsetto-femina voice, "you're too slow at that
+calling.  The clearing men need Nelson on a machine from now on.
+You'll have to do less talking and faster work."
+
+The grey-haired clerk reddened, but said nothing, aloud.  What he said
+under his breath was sulphur-tipped.
+
+It seemed to Key that every time the boys took a minute off to discuss
+personal affairs or the world outside the bank, a jealous bank demon
+showed its teeth.
+
+The sentiments of Robb and Key made quite an impression on Nelson, but
+he argued that where there was so much said against the bank there must
+be a good deal to be said in its favor.  He might have used the same
+argument with reference to a national evil, for instance.
+
+"Hey, Nelson!" called Marks of the C's, "are you nearly through there?
+We're in an awful mess here with the C---- Bank.  Their clearing is
+balled every day."
+
+"All right," replied the cash-book man, leaving a few odds and ends of
+his own work, "is it the Queen Street branch again?"
+
+"Yes," said Cantel; "I think it's too near the Asylum grounds."
+
+The savings man turned around and chuckled.  "Mutt and Jeff get quite
+humorous at times," he said, pointing to tall Marks and short Cantel.
+
+The paying-teller laughed, so did Willis and the cash-book man.  There
+are moments of fun in a city bank, but they are brief and reactive.
+The boys never get acquainted to any extent.  They rarely help each
+other out, either, for they all have their hands full, and every bit of
+extra work they do reacts on their own post at night, early mornings,
+or Sundays.  Sometimes there is a utility man, but he either dies young
+or prays for a move to the Maritime Provinces, where he can recuperate
+in a summer resort.
+
+"That's enough from you, Johnson," said Marks; "crawl into that pipe of
+a savings and close the cover, or we'll make you smell the leather down
+cellar."
+
+"You call the savings a 'pipe,' do you?  Say, Marks, you'd have seven
+kinds of delirium tremens if you smoked this pipe."
+
+Cantel tore off a slip and looked up.
+
+"Ninety cents out," he said.  "Marks is familiar with seventy times
+seven snakes already, Johnsy.  He's getting to the crocodile stage.
+Last night at the Gai--"
+
+"Shut up, Cant," whispered Marks, frowning; "it isn't time for the
+great trump to sound, just yet."
+
+"Who mentioned trumps?" inquired Jack Brower, one of the current
+ledgermen, who had come around to drum up "stuff."
+
+The boys laughed in chorus.
+
+"Hey, less noise out there," called Levison, already experiencing a
+"kick" from the laugh of a minute before.
+
+Marks was about to waken Brower to a proper understanding when Charon
+popped around the paying-cage.
+
+"Look here," he said sharply, "this noise has got to stop.  What are
+you doing here, Brower?  Can't they keep you in C's?  What's the matter
+with the clearing anyway? ..... Nelson, I'm going to put this in your
+charge, and I want you to see that the ledgers have their stuff by
+ten-thirty at latest."
+
+Thus another responsibility was loaded on the creaking shoulders of the
+cash-book man; but nothing was said of added remuneration.  Every week
+or month, as a man increases his speed or loses his power of resisting
+imposition, he is screwed more and more tightly to the "wall," which,
+in banking, means a desk.
+
+"Do you know what you are?" said Johnson to Evan, when the accountant
+had gone.  "You're a darn idiot.  Why don't you kick?"
+
+"Aw, shut up," Marks butted in, "how's a fellow going to get out of it?
+Why, Johnsy, you'd have a hemorrhage if you ever let yourself dream of
+talking back to the accountant."
+
+Mr. Charon might stop the noise, but he could never put an end to the
+conversation of the clearing men.  They rattled on, like their adding
+machines, jabbing back and forth and getting off speeches that are
+never heard in vaudeville, but still turning out the figures at a rapid
+rate.  They worked mechanically, and their minds had to find diversion.
+That it was not valuable diversion was due to the environment.  In the
+first place the work was monotonous, and the mind naturally sought a
+channel of entertainment, rather than of thought; in the second place,
+one got accustomed to the line of talk popular with the boys and unless
+he mixed with them he was out of the swim and in a cold, silent current
+of his own.
+
+Sometimes the diversion Evan permitted himself took the form of Frankie
+Arling.  It was not often, now, that he thought of her seriously--that
+is, as his wife.  Seven years was too long a time to look ahead.  He
+could not, after a good many months in the world of business, realize
+Frankie as he had done in those old school-days; but he could still
+think of her, in an ideal way.
+
+Would Frankie be proud of him if she could see him handling that
+mysterious jumble of figures called the "cash book?"  He wondered how
+the "city" way, which he believed himself to be acquiring, would appeal
+to the sweet country girl.  He smiled as he thought of summer
+vacation--not such a great while off--when he should go back to Hometon
+and--and what?  He did not know.  He couldn't carry back tales of
+success, for his salary was only four hundred dollars a year.  He
+couldn't go back well dressed, because he was fifty dollars in debt to
+the bank, and owed a tailor's bill in Banfield....  Invariably thoughts
+of the girl he knew he loved brought him misery and despondency.
+Thoughts of home brought him little less.  He might have known, from
+that, that either he or the bank was a failure; but a fellow of
+nineteen looks through a smoked glass.  To say that Evan did not think
+is scarcely the fact.  He did think, but spasmodically.  The mind is a
+dual thing: the superficial mind can be employed on an adding machine
+and leave the thinking function free to operate in any direction; but
+before that is possible the superficial mind must be familiar with the
+object that engages it.  It is not an easy matter to figure sterling
+exchange, for instance, and at the same time think about irrelevant
+things; but it is easy to run an adding machine, or even to add, and
+think simultaneously.  On the cash book Evan found himself engaged in
+all kinds of work; on some of it he had to concentrate (although no
+"brain power" was necessary), while on some of it he worked
+mechanically.  Whenever a period of serious dissatisfaction, brought on
+by something Robb or Key had said, troubled him, it was of short
+duration: something always broke into his mind and scattered the
+argument framing there.  By the time he was free to resume the argument
+foreign thoughts had intervened, and his brain was in a muddle.  Before
+the muddle could be dissipated by a cold point of common sense,
+something else had come along.  And so things went.  So the days and
+weeks went.
+
+When Evan got a night off, sick and tired of struggling with figures
+and fancies, he indulged in some of the exciting amusements of the
+city, which were new and attractive to him, and in "quiet little
+games."  He was slipping into a rut, and probably he would have stayed
+there for months or even years, like hundreds of other young Canadian
+bankboys, had not the poverty of his existence driven him to the
+temporary form of relief known among bankclerks as "kiting."
+
+"Bankclerks are always hard up."  This is one of the public's
+chestnuts.  It is not a horse-chestnut, however; this one is
+digestible.  It is a fact.  The reason is, chiefly--poor pay.  It is
+absolutely necessary for a fellow to either get money from home (even
+after three years' service) or to borrow and fly kites.  Kite-flying is
+the last resort.  It is simply a matter of cashing a cheque on your own
+bank through some other bank whose clerks are known to you, or through
+some outlying branch of your own bank, and keeping that cheque out
+(keeping the kite flying) until pay-day comes and you can deposit to
+meet it.  There is nothing dishonest in the transaction: customers
+float cheques all the time.  The bank cannot lose through the kiting of
+clerks; only tellers who cash the kite can lose, and they know the
+"flyer" before taking a chance.
+
+Sometimes a floated cheque floats home sooner than expected, and then
+there is some sudden high-financing to be done.
+
+It was the custom in Evan's bank for the accountant to look after all
+clearing items on which exchange had been added by other banks.  When
+the clearing men on the machines registered a bill with exchange they
+laid it aside for the accountant to see.  The clearing of that 23rd of
+May was very heavy, and everybody was rushed.
+
+"Here are your exchange amounts," said Marks, turning his bunch over to
+Cantel.
+
+"Do you want them now, Nelson?" asked Cantel, "or shall I rush them up
+to the accountant and give them to you later?"
+
+"Take them up," said Evan, puzzling over a badly-figured cheque, "and
+wait for them.  He's been holding them back lately, and the
+ledger-keepers are developing claws."
+
+When Cantel came back he had the exchange items, but he seemed
+thoughtful, and looked askance at Evan.
+
+"Nelson," he whispered, "come here; I've got something coming....
+Whose cheque do you suppose Charon kept back for further investigation?"
+
+"Not mine from Creek Bend, was it?"
+
+"You're on."
+
+The cash-book man's face reddened.
+
+"I didn't expect it in for three or four days yet," he said.  "Dunn
+never would do a trick like that on me; he must have misunderstood."
+
+Cantel laughed.
+
+"I wouldn't take it so hard," he said; "everybody's doing it."
+
+"I know," replied Evan, "but when I first came here Pen----"
+
+"Forget it," said Cantel, turning to his work, "they need guys like you
+and me around here too much to kick over a kite."
+
+So the "C" man thought.  Every junior man seems to think that he is
+necessary to the bank.  The older he grows the smaller he becomes in
+his own estimation, because in the bank's estimation.  The bank
+understands the advantages of "depreciation" in stocks--and employes.
+
+Before Evan could find a clerk who was willing or able to lend him
+enough to cover the cheque for eight dollars he had issued to pay board
+and buy a pair of shoes, Charon had set eyes on him from a distance and
+was beckoning to him.
+
+The accountant had little glittering eyes.  They shone out of his
+smooth, round face like boot-buttons from a lump of dough.  He fixed
+them on the cash-book man.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," he said politely, "I'm sorry to tell you that head office
+has just telephoned down and asked for your resignation."
+
+"My resignation!"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"But Mr. Charon, you're not going----"
+
+"It's not my doing at all," said Charon, interrupting; "anything you
+have to say had better be told to the manager."
+
+Evan had never been introduced to the manager, but he walked into the
+big private office and started saying he scarcely knew what.
+
+"Oh, are you Mr.--er--, the young man whom head office has asked to
+resign?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"I'm sorry I cannot do anything for you."
+
+"But won't you tell me why I'm fired?"
+
+The cash-book man gazed fiercely into the manager's eyes.  A thought
+for his personal safety probably decided the pompous old gentleman to
+compromise a little.
+
+"It's on account of that cheque you issued--and--and--"
+
+"And what?"
+
+"And that Banfield affair!"
+
+The truth dawned on Evan.  He stood for a moment oblivious of his
+surroundings, thinking of his father and mother and friends.  He was
+suspected.  It was worse than Robb had said: he was not only under
+disfavor, but under suspicion.  Head office had only waited for a
+pretext to fire him.
+
+"But I didn't take that money----" he began.
+
+"Those are my instructions," replied the manager, turning to his work.
+
+Evan felt sick.  He tried to make the accountant talk, but all Charon
+would say was:
+
+"You'll have to grin and bear it."
+
+"Well, can I see the inspector?" asked Evan, in desperation.
+
+"I wouldn't advise you to; it will do no good."
+
+Turning away, the cash-book man entered a telephone booth and called up
+Castle.
+
+"This is Mr. Nelson," he said, "of Banfield.  Can I see you, sir?"
+
+"No," snapped Castle; "I'm very busy."
+
+"But I want to tell----"
+
+The receiver clicked.  Evan was aware of an answering sound somewhere
+within himself, as though the ties that bound him to honesty and
+good-faith had suddenly snapped.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+_BLACKBALLED._
+
+During the progress of the drama in which Nelson played so conspicuous
+a part and which he regarded as a tragedy, Sam Robb was at the
+Receiver-General's exchanging money for the paying-teller.  He had not
+returned before Evan was gone from the office for good.
+
+"What am I to do, Mr. Charon?" Nelson asked the accountant, after
+Inspector Castle's insult.
+
+"Grin and bear it," repeated the accountant, thinking, no doubt, that
+he had hit upon a very happy phrase.
+
+Evan felt that it would take all his moral valor to "bear it" without
+the "grinning."  He fulfilled that latter half of Charon's command--it
+seemed like a command rather than a suggestion, to the bank-trained
+clerk--three or four years later.
+
+"But what about the fifty dollars I owe the bank?" he asked.
+
+"I suppose you'll have to put it up," said Charon, studying the
+expression of the face before him.
+
+"But there is three months' salary coming to me, according to the Rules
+and Regulations," replied Evan.
+
+The accountant did not have to scratch his head; apparently he was
+prepared to act deliberately.
+
+"Well," he said, "since they haven't said anything about the silver you
+had better say nothing.  We are paying you two weeks in advance; let it
+go at that."
+
+For a moment Evan figured.  There is no crisis where a bankclerk can't
+figure.  Three months' salary would be $90.  That was coming to him.
+But he owed the bank $50, and they had paid him $15 more than was due,
+leaving only $25 due him.  It would not pay to fight them for so small
+an amount.  In fact, he did not know how to fight; besides, the vim was
+knocked out of him and he only wanted to get away from that wretched
+office.  A strong revulsion possessed him; he turned away from the
+accountant without answering, and his eyes wandered about the dark,
+bad-smelling office.  He suddenly discovered that he hated every desk,
+every book, and the brazen-faced fixtures.
+
+But coming to his own desk he found the work piling up, and
+mechanically he lifted a pen to straighten things up a bit before
+leaving.  A good bankman, under any circumstances whatever, cannot
+endure to see things in a mess.  Evan had scarcely taken up his pen to
+make an entry in the "bank book" when Alfred Castle glided toward him
+and said in a high-pitched, authoritative tone:
+
+"Never mind that, Nelson; you're through here and we want you to quit."
+
+The fired clerk was too badly wounded, for the moment, to be angry.
+Later, he wondered why Fate should have been so spiteful as to send
+Castle, above all others, on that humiliating errand.  He suddenly
+remembered the way Alfred had greeted him on his arrival in Toronto,
+and came to the conclusion that from the first he had been under
+suspicion with that respectable nephew of the "Big Eye's."
+
+Evan went down to the basement for his hat, not quite expecting to find
+it there; in truth, he would not have been much surprised to find the
+basement itself gone.  Certainly, the foundation had disappeared from
+under a structure mightier and stronger, as he viewed it, than piles of
+stone and mortar.  He had frequently criticized the office slavery of
+the bank, but he had never lost faith in the institution's magnitude
+and imperishability.  It was the solidity of it that he had banked on
+and clung to, in spite of blinding work; but now the golden god had
+crumbled, like the smitten image of Daniel's dream--so far as Evan was
+concerned.  The idol still stood for idolaters, of course, like that
+other image in the Prophet's time; but to the enlightened, the
+awakened, it had perished.  And, to carry the analogy further, Evan,
+like Daniel, saw before he understood.  He must have his vision
+interpreted for him.  Time would accomplish that.  Just now he gazed
+and wondered.  Clearly he saw a ruin, but as yet it was inseparable
+debris, and the sight of it put his head in a muddle....  While he
+washed his hands in the basement he stared at the wall, and looking
+away from that his eyes met those of Bill Watson.
+
+"Hello," said Bill, hurriedly, "what are you fooling away your time
+down here for at this hour of the day?  You must have the c. b. down
+finer than ever I got it, Nelsy.  By gum, you've travelled some since
+you came here; I was on the job six months----"
+
+Watson paused suddenly.
+
+"What's the matter?" he asked.
+
+Evan saw that Bill was uninformed.  Such is the rush of a city office
+that one man does not know what happens to another, until the pipes are
+lit and "chewing the fat" commences.
+
+In a few words Nelson told his old desk-mate what had happened.  Bill
+was speechless.  He did not even swear.  He stood looking at Evan, but
+his eyes seemed too wide-open to see anything.  While he was trying to
+frame words the voice of Charon sounded at the head of the basement
+stairs.
+
+"Watson, Watson!"  A customer was probably waiting to deposit.
+
+Urgent as was the accountant's voice, Bill delayed long enough to shake
+hands and say:
+
+"Come up and see me at the boarding-house; I want to tell you
+something."
+
+Evan half promised--but never went.  The next time he saw Bill they
+were far away from Toronto and banking.
+
+As the cash-book man walked through the office with his hat in his
+hand, Marks, the C man, shouted:
+
+"Hey, the banks are balanced!"
+
+Evidently the accountant had kept the matter quiet.  The boys who
+happened to see Nelson pass out of the front door probably thought he
+was taken with one of his violent headaches, and had gone for a
+druggist's dose.  He had done that several times during his cash-book
+experience.  Once he had been taken with an acute indigestion pain and
+a doctor was called in.  The doctor advised him to take a taxi home.  A
+few days later the bankclerk was presented with a bill for $3.50--half
+a week's salary.  The indigestion, needless to say, had been caused by
+eating a cold lunch under the nervous excitement of waiting work.
+Another time he had been searching in the vault for a package of old
+vouchers and a book had fallen on him, breaking both lenses of his
+glasses: cost $4.50--more than half a week's pay.  Those things were
+all "in a day's work," Willis used to say.  So were board and bed.  The
+fact of the matter is, Nelson was given nothing and had nothing outside
+of a day's work; a day's work was what he lived for.  And there are
+hundreds of Nelsons in the banks now.
+
+As Evan passed Charon, the accountant did not raise his head; nor did
+Castle lift his.  Evan did not care; they were nothing to him now.
+Neither was the bank anything to him.  He cursed it; in oaths he had
+never expected to use he cursed it.
+
+With the very taste of profanity on his lips, Nelson stood absently
+gazing into a liquor store.  The shiny bottles fascinated him.  He
+wondered if the stuff in them was all that it seemed to men to be;
+would it drown care and disappointment?  Above all, would it bring
+unconsciousness?
+
+He had seen Robb lying drunk, and the sight had interested him.  Robb's
+sprees were not bestial like Penton's; they were dead, harmless.  That
+was the sort of thing Evan, in his melancholy state of mind, would
+like.  He had tasted liquor and it rather tickled his palate; why not
+carry a bottle up to the boarding-house and go in soak for the
+afternoon?  He knew it was wrong, but he wanted to do something
+desperate; also, he wanted to make sure of falling asleep and
+forgetting everything.  He thought of his mother and sister, and of
+Frankie, as he looked into the liquor store.  That was just the
+trouble, he thought too much about them.  What would they think of his
+dismissal?  It would break the mother's heart and the girls could never
+understand.  Evan was in a torture of worry.  He wanted to cry, as he
+would have done ten years before, but that was out of the question--he
+was twenty; so he repeated an oath that made him shiver and feel
+penitent, then went deliberately into the wine shop.  He bought two
+flasks of cognac, and slipping one into each hip-pocket turned up Queen
+Street to University Avenue.
+
+Mrs. Greig was in the kitchen when Nelson reached the boarding-house.
+He went quietly up the stairs to his room, which had been done up and
+would not see the maid again that day, and shut himself in.  Unscrewing
+the top of one flask, he put the neck to his mouth and swallowed two
+gulps.  The room was warm, but he did not think to open the window.  He
+sat back in a wicker chair and concentrated his mind on the liquor.
+How much would it take to make him drunk? how long would it take?  He
+looked for immediate results from the first two mouthfuls, and finding
+none drank again.  Feeling a slight nausea the second time he waited
+several minutes, and a tingling sensation succeeded the nausea.  Then
+he gulped some more, and the flask was half gone.  He settled back in
+his chair and his eyes grew heavy.  Afraid the effect might work off he
+drank again, after which the room swam so that he had difficulty in
+catching the bed.  His mind was acutely alert to everything for quite a
+while, although his limbs were incredibly heavy.  But by and by he
+seemed to see his soul retire behind a black drape--and came oblivion.
+
+It was after-hours in the bank.  The boys worked away as though nothing
+had happened.  It had been whispered that Nelson was fired, but each
+clerk had something in his own experience which he considered just as
+sensational as that.  Far from philosophizing on the treatment accorded
+Nelson, some of the boys made his misfortunes serve to emphasize the
+reckless awfulness of their own careers, the uncertainty of which was a
+source of pride and self-congratulation.  There are bank-fools who take
+delight in the very unsubstantiality of their occupation; instead of
+treating their avocation with the seriousness one's life-work deserves,
+they look upon it as a game or a joke.  These fellows are greatly in
+the minority, of course; but usually a city office harbors several of
+the type.  Two or three of them had their heads together around the
+cash-book desk, where Marks was now reigning monarch.
+
+"Shut up, will you," bawled the ex-C man, flushed with the worry of a
+new post; "it's a wonder they wouldn't fire ---- things like you
+instead of a good man."
+
+Marks was speaking to boys of longer service in the bank than himself;
+but it is an unwritten law that the cash-book man is supreme in his own
+circle--and the gabblers mentioned were standing on one of the radii.
+They glanced at his red face, his burly figure and small ankles, and
+gradually moved away.
+
+In the furnace-room three old clerks were solemnly conversing, like the
+ghosts of departed bank-victims once incarcerated there.
+
+"It's the old story, Sam," said Key, referring to something Robb had
+been saying about the Banfield affair; "Penton has gone there so
+recently the bank couldn't transfer him without rousing suspicion in
+the minds of Banfield customers; so they made Nelson the goat."
+
+"They couldn't do it in Banfield, though," suggested Willis, "because
+everybody there must know the boy is honest.  They moved him to the
+city to get him out of the way, and then waited a chance to fire him on
+a trumped-up charge."
+
+Robb turned his head and expectorated on the concrete floor.
+
+"Boys," he said, "it's too dirty to talk about.  It's like them, by
+----, it's like them!  They know that Penton is the thief and crook,
+but they are afraid of losing business if they move him away.  Evans
+tells me another bank had a man up there and thought of opening.  Old
+Castle knows that, and he's afraid of giving a bad impression by
+shifting managers.  But he wants to make Penton believe that head
+office trusts him, and in order to do that he fires the poor innocent
+kid.  In cases like this, to justify its bluff about seeing and knowing
+everything that goes on, the bank _must_ have a suspicion, the wrong
+_must_ be atoned for.  If it will not answer to convict the guilty one
+look for a goat.  It doesn't matter a hang to the bank whether a
+fellow's reputation is ruined or not.  Bah!  I'm sick of it."
+
+Willis smiled around the stem of his pipe.
+
+"I wonder," he said, "what they'll do with Penton.  They certainly must
+suspect him.  They at least must know he's a booze fighter."
+
+"Oh, don't worry," replied Key, "they're watching him.  It doesn't suit
+their present purpose to fire him, therefore they keep him on; but they
+know perfectly well he won't try any more of his monkey work for a
+while.  They'll soak him some time, when the psychological moment
+comes.  I used to know the son-of-a-gun; he's a yellow dog, and he'll
+be good now for a while out of pure cowardice.  As for drinking, he's
+not the only bank manager who souses regularly.  They'll stand for him
+a while, until it will look reasonable to move him."
+
+Robb grunted.
+
+"They know Penton wouldn't take a chance on anything big in the way of
+a personal loan from the cash, and they'd rather have a teller lose
+fifty now and then than to lose business."
+
+In that strain the three old clerks talked about the Business they had
+once--and their relatives still--worshipped.
+
+Quite early Sam Robb arrived at the boarding-house.  He met Mrs. Greig
+on the verandah and looked for signs of news in her eyes.  But she
+merely wished him good-evening.
+
+"Has Nelson been home yet?" he asked, forgetting to speak about the
+beautiful May weather.
+
+"No, I don't think so," said Mrs. Greig.
+
+"I suppose he went over to the Island," thought Robb; "although that
+wouldn't seem like Evan.  I'll bet this thing has bust him all up."
+
+Absent-mindedly Robb turned the knob of his room door and walked in.
+He uttered a whispered exclamation.
+
+On the bed, in his clothes, lay the ex-cash-book man, dead to the
+world, as he wanted to be.  An uncorked flask almost empty stood on the
+dresser, and beside it an unopened flask.
+
+For a moment the humor of the situation struck Robb, and he laughed
+silently in a chair.  But by degrees his face sobered, and he gazed
+pensively out of the window, a shade of sadness reflected in his
+countenance.  At length he rose and taking the flasks from the dresser
+emptied their contents in a basin.  Then he took off the sleeper's
+shoes and undressed him by degrees.  Evan groaned during the exercise
+but did not waken.  He slept through, indeed, until the following
+morning.
+
+Very early he crawled out of bed and doused himself in the bath-tub.
+He was sick at his stomach and his head felt like a hogshead;
+unaccustomed to liquor as he was, the cognac had taken violent effect.
+He staggered, although perfectly "sober," and wondered if he would ever
+get his shoes laced.  His room-mate in the bed opposite him heard the
+rummaging.
+
+"Good night, Evan," he said sleepily, as though just turning in.
+
+For a moment Evan was confused and actually thought it must be evening,
+but a smothered chuckle from beneath the sheets of the other bed
+notified him that it was really the morning after.
+
+"What time is it?" he asked; "my watch has stopped."
+
+Robb made an effort to keep sober, more than Evan had done the previous
+day, and told the time.  He dressed with his back to the young man,
+indulging the while in inward bursts of merriment.  The soberness of
+Evan's countenance made it all the more difficult for his friend to
+contain himself.
+
+Evan did not suspect that Robb was enjoying a one-sided entertainment,
+until a mirror betrayed the fact; then he, himself, laughed.  The
+louder he laughed, the louder he wanted to laugh.  The old clerk joined
+him frankly, and when they had done, cried--
+
+"Isn't this a ridiculous world?"
+
+Evan agreed that it was.  Gradually he lost his sense of humor,
+however, for after-intoxication is a series of reactions, and a
+headache reminded him that alcohol was said to be hard on the nerves.
+
+"Where are you going?" Sam asked him, as Evan took his straw hat from a
+hook.
+
+"Out in the air," he said; "I feel rotten."
+
+"Get some good strong coffee, Evan; that will fix you up sooner than
+anything.  Fresh air is too natural a remedy to cure an unnatural thing
+like a drunk, especially a fellow's first drunk."
+
+Again the elder man laughed, and this time he begged his young friend's
+pardon.
+
+"You mustn't be sore on me for having such a good time at your
+expense," he said; "but really I never saw anything quite so funny in
+my life.  You the temperate and sober-minded cash-book man....  By the
+way, you must stick around here until you land a job."
+
+Nelson began to say that he was under too great obligation already, and
+felt that it would hardly be square; but Robb interrupted him with a
+couple of powerful expletives, and they agreed to another week's
+companionship.
+
+After coffee Evan thought he would like to walk down University Avenue
+with Robb, and did so for a few blocks; but the lightness of his head
+counselled a shady and steady bench.  He fell by the wayside.
+
+"Just rest up to-day, old man," advised Sam, "and don't worry.  It's
+very dangerous to stew when you're already pickled."
+
+Evan smiled half-heartedly and promised to spend the day at Island Park.
+
+"I'm glad you're not coming all the way," said Robb, without much humor
+in his face.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I wouldn't want your destination to be the bank, for fear it might
+sometime get to be your destiny--like mine."
+
+"Are you glad they fired me?"
+
+"Not exactly, Evan; but I'm glad you're out."
+
+"What do you think of the way they did it?"
+
+Robb glowered at a passing limousine.
+
+"Don't ask me," he said fiercely.  "From now on my daily prayer is for
+a chance to get back at them.  I hope it will come.  All my life in the
+business, Evan, I've seen instances, like this, of the bank's
+mercilessness.  I'm sick and tired of it.  It's you who are lucky, my
+lad, and I who am unlucky."
+
+"Still," said Evan, "it's an awful thing to feel that you're suspected
+of being a thief."
+
+Robb's eyes flamed.
+
+"They don't think it," he said sharply; "the rascals know you are
+innocent!  It is not their opinion that hurts, Evan, but their
+influence--I hope--"  He did not finish it.  "I wonder," he continued,
+"if these fellows know what it is to hear their hearts beat?  They
+claim to be big men; they make a great display of affection among their
+own folk, but when it comes to showing humane consideration for
+someone, they can't do it.  They only invest friendship or justice
+where it will, like the money they invest, bring big returns.  The
+clerk is only one of the many who don't count with them.  What does he
+matter to them?--they wear him out and pay him out for gain."
+
+The ex-manager spoke with emphasis and his lips puckered as after a
+bitter expectoration.
+
+"I hope," said Evan, "that some day you'll get a chance to quit."
+
+"That sounds good, coming from you," replied Robb.  "I only live on
+that hope myself.  Sometimes it seems forlorn enough, though....  By
+Jove! it's after nine; I must beat it.  I'll see you at dinner
+to-night, eh?"
+
+"All right."
+
+Evan watched the old clerk down the avenue, and he remembered the first
+time he had seen that gait.  It was in Mt. Alban on a May day, too.
+The juvenile bankman had pictured himself walking down the main street
+of some town inside a manager's clothes and shoes--just like Mr. Robb.
+
+But thinking made Evan's head thump.  He decided it would be a good
+idea to catch a McCaul car and connect with the ferry for Island Park.
+He boarded the car, together with one or two women and a little girl
+carrying a lunch indigestible anywhere but on Centre Island.
+
+The beauty and quietude of Toronto's rest resort and the sparkling
+freshness of the surrounding water, revived Evan a little; but a
+stronger liquid than H2O was around his brain somewhere, and the Island
+became uncomfortable.  In spite of the pleasant environment he found
+himself unable to take his mind off the bank and what it had done to
+him.  Early in the afternoon, he suddenly imagined that he could endure
+no longer to sit and worry, so he took the ferry back to the city and
+went to the office of the _Star_.
+
+After inserting an advertisement for a position as bookkeeper--saying
+nothing about recommendations--he waited around the Star office with a
+crowd of other work-seekers until the afternoon edition emanated from
+the large mouth of a small newsboy.  He felt more like crawling away in
+some alley and dying than hunting a job, but he was anxious to
+obliterate the bank from his mind; and besides, he wanted to have
+another situation before writing home that he had quit the bank.
+
+Evan did not have the faintest intention of telling his people he had
+been fired.  They would not understand it, he knew.  How could they
+understand such medieval work?  This was not a day of inquisitions or
+guillotines!  But when he was established in a better position than the
+one he had left, it would be easy to explain that he had resigned.  He
+knew that his father was not much in favor of banking anyway.
+
+The first ad that attracted the ex-clerk belonged to an abattoir
+company near the lake-front.  He wasted no time in getting to their
+office.
+
+"Where have you been working?" asked the manager.
+
+"In the S---- Bank," replied Evan.
+
+"Why did you leave?"
+
+"My salary was too small."
+
+"Well, I believe you will be all right.  Just drop in to-morrow morning
+at nine o'clock, Mr. Nelson, and I think I can put you to work."
+
+The salary was to be eight dollars a week with good opportunities for
+advancement.  The slaughter-house smelt quite pleasant to Evan as he
+passed it on his way to the car.  He felt joyful at heart, and hopeful
+for the future.
+
+But, oh, that head, how it ached!  What sense was there in drinking to
+drown sorrow when a fellow suffered so the day after?  His stomach was
+sick, and he couldn't endure the sight of a wine-shop.  After all, he
+thought, the liquor was not a drowner of sorrow, but a procrastinator;
+and, as in the case of postponed debts, interest was added.
+
+Robb was in their room when Evan arrived at Mrs. Greig's boarding-house.
+
+"Well," said the old bankclerk, "how do you feel now?"
+
+"No more booze for me," replied Evan, smiling.
+
+Robb answered with a smile.  "I'm glad you're not worrying anyway, old
+chap.  Things will be all right before long."
+
+"The reason I'm not worrying," said Evan, "is because I've got another
+job.  I go on in the morning."
+
+He explained about the abattoir company's offer.
+
+"Well, you're the limit!  What salary?"
+
+"Eight a week.  They asked me where I'd been working, and why I left."
+
+Robb asked quickly:
+
+"What did you say?"
+
+"I told them the bank, and said I left because of insufficient salary."
+
+The elder man was thoughtful.  "I guess that's about all you could
+say," he replied.
+
+If Evan had not felt so fagged he would probably have written home that
+he had a new position: as it was, he went to bed early, and arose next
+morning feeling like a human being.  He walked down the avenue with his
+room-mate, who wished him good luck at Queen Street.
+
+It was before nine when he reached the office of the abattoir company.
+The manager came in punctually, and gave the young applicant a cold nod.
+
+"Mr. Nelson," he said, "I'm sorry we cannot give you that position.  I
+telephoned the manager of the bank you worked for and he referred me to
+head office, who said they could not recommend you."
+
+Thunderstruck, dumb-smitten, unable to say a word in his defence
+against the lies of head office, Evan turned away.  He walked north to
+King Street, more miserable than he had ever been in his life.  He
+wondered, behind his misery, why the bank would not recommend him; were
+they intent on making a criminal of him?
+
+The day passed slowly.  Evan waited for his old friend at the
+boarding-house, and nursed a growing headache.
+
+"I was afraid of it," said Robb.  "Bank officials justify themselves
+and the bank no matter what happens.  Besides being determined to carry
+out any bluff they have started they will never admit that they pay a
+man too little salary.  If he quits because of starvation pay they say
+he was no good as a clerk.  The bank must maintain at all costs what it
+calls its dignity.  Dignity be--"
+
+Instead of swearing the old bankclerk sighed.  He had often said he was
+tired; now he thoroughly looked it.
+
+Evan sighed too, but chiefly on account of the pain in his head.  He
+went to bed both sick and discouraged, but in an hour he was too sick
+to think of discouragement.  Mrs. Greig had a doctor in, and the
+ex-bankclerk was given a hypodermic injection.  It drove away his pains
+and sent him sailing into a pleasant land.
+
+Sam Robb did not rest so blissfully.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+_A BANKCLERK'S GIRL._
+
+After three days' sickness Evan realized, and the doctor emphasized it,
+that he had been near to nervous collapse.
+
+"The country and outside work for you now, young man," said the
+physician; "leave offices to men with broad shoulders, like Mr. Robb's."
+
+"Yes," observed Robb, present at the consultation, "let them kill the
+man who wants to die.  I think you're right, doctor; Nelson needs a
+dose of farming.  I have it, Evan! .... I know a fine fellow on a fruit
+and vegetable farm near Hamilton.  He'll be tickled to death to have
+you, as long as you want to stay; and you'll save money, too."
+
+"A good idea," added the physician, to whose profession money usually
+looks good.
+
+In a day or two Evan was ready to go in search of health.  A telegram
+from Robb to the Hamilton man brought a phone response that fixed a
+salary of thirty dollars a month with board.  It looked like a fortune
+to the ex-bankclerk, and he was eager to begin work.
+
+"Before I go, Mr. Robb," he said, somewhat backwardly, "I want to ask
+you to do something for me."
+
+"Name it," said Sam.
+
+"I don't want my folks to know I'm out of the bank.  If they knew I was
+farming for my health they'd be offended because I didn't go to
+Hometon.  But I can't bear the thoughts of going back home
+down-and-out---you know how it is."
+
+Sam nodded.  "I understand how you feel about it."
+
+"Well, I'm going to forward the weekly letter I write to mother and let
+you re-mail it from Toronto, addressed on the typewriter.  I'll only be
+a month getting in shape, and then I'll have an office job somewhere."
+
+An "office job" embodied Evan's conception of success, as it did that
+of his relatives, and many another golden-calf worshipper.  He had yet
+to be weaned.
+
+"I'll do it, my lad," replied Robb, cheerfully; "now then, off with
+you.  And don't forget to write.  If, after a month or so, I run across
+anything in town that I think would appeal to you, I'll wire.  Japers
+lives right in the suburbs of Hamilton, and has a telephone."
+
+The "T. H. & B." carried westward a considerably happier mortal than
+had been in Evan Nelson's shoes for many a day.
+
+Japers' farm showed up to advantage on a fine May morning.  So did his
+daughter, Lizzie.  She was plump, pretty, and peasant-like.  Her
+efforts to sneak cream and sugar into the new "hand's" tea a second and
+third time were evidence of her normal good nature, if nothing more.
+
+The first day out the ex-bankclerk did not do much.  He was busy
+admiring the symmetry of gardens and orchards, though not of daughters.
+In his part of the country those who took any interest in fruit raising
+allowed the trees to grow up, out, and into each other without
+molestation, believing in the ever-lasting benevolence of Providence
+and the frailty of pests; with the result that fruit became wormier and
+scarcer every year.  But in the "Fruit Belt" conditions were different;
+everywhere was order and care; the budding blossoms made the
+well-ordered fruit patches fairy groves for beauty.  The first day of
+his sojourn Evan opened his nostrils, closed his eyes, forgot the bank,
+and thanked God some doctors knew their business.
+
+His employer would have had him rest a second day, and particularly
+would Miss Japers have done so, but Evan wanted to show that he was a
+worker, and also had an eye on the coming dollar per day.  So he walked
+manfully up the rhubarb patch and set to work.  Occasionally a muscle
+slipped and he jerked a whole root out of the ground; but this error
+was remedied immediately by clawing a little dirt around the root and
+leaving it--to die.  Evan, of course, was innocent of harm done: he saw
+no reason why rhubarb should not grow in loose dirt as well as tight.
+
+In his sleep, the second night, he wandered in a field of burdocks,
+plucking the largest stalks for Burdock Blood Bitters.  He stopped to
+chat with a buxom girl possessed of an innocent, rustic manner, and
+thought she laughed at his white, feminine hands.  Next day, as a
+coincidence with his dream, Lizzie Japers did remark about the
+ex-clerk's hands, but the stains on them and not their whiteness
+elicited her observations--and decided her to telephone to the grocer's
+for a box of snap.
+
+When his back got used to bending Evan began to enjoy gardening.  He
+felt like a bird that had flown out of a cellar into a garden.  Lake
+Ontario sent a breeze up to him, to carry his mind away on its wings.
+Peach blossoms were turning more pink; sight of them and the smell of
+them made the world irresistibly charming.  Was it really he who had
+wallowed in janitor's dust and vault damps with a monster called "Cash
+Book?"  Was not that but a figment of those vague nightmares he had had
+as a child, when he fell asleep with his clothes on?
+
+Anyway, it did not exist now; and the superb happiness of that
+realization made the days fly--and days brought dollars.  Of course,
+money did not matter so much now that he had no landlady to pacify; he
+would have been satisfied with fifty cents a day and board.  Such meals
+as he got!--onions, radishes, lettuce, cream, butter made from real
+cream, eggs still bearing traces of the hen, and everything to build
+without poisoning.
+
+During the first week a letter came from Hometon.  It had been
+addressed in care of Mrs. Greig, Toronto, and forwarded by Robb.  It
+was from Evan's mother.  She complained of not having received much
+news lately, and hoped nothing was wrong.  Above all things she hoped
+her son was not working too hard.  The son smiled as he read; if his
+mother could only see him sitting in a lettuce patch, dairied and
+sleeves up, what would she think?  What would Lou and Frankie think?
+
+The letter Evan answered with was diplomatic.  It went, in part, like
+this: "I am feeling better than I have felt for two years.  The work I
+am doing is not hard on me; I like it mighty well.  My health was bad
+for a while after landing in the city, but now it is changing for the
+better every day.  My appetite is past the decent stage.  And what do
+you know about this?--I'm saving money at last!"  There were no
+committals in the letter.
+
+The second Saturday of Nelson's engagement with Jim Japers, the old
+gentleman came around and said: "About time you was ringin' off, Mr.
+Nelson."  (He always addressed his new man respectfully: could an
+ordinary mortal come out of a bank?)  "It's Saturday, you know.  Me and
+wife always goes into town a-Saturday, and sometimes the kid.  We count
+it a day off, and now that's what we wants you to do."
+
+A countryman always enjoys getting to anything pleasant in a roundabout
+manner.  Evan felt the good news coming and warmed up to a full
+appreciation of it.  Saturday afternoon in the bank had always been a
+time for cleaning up loose ends of work.
+
+"Thank you, Mr. Japers," he said, warmly; "I believe a show _would_ do
+me good.  I didn't have time to see many in Toronto."
+
+"That's right, my boy, enjoy yourself.  They say them Toronto shows
+isn't as good as we get here.  What do you think, now?"
+
+"I don't imagine they are," replied Evan, quickly; and then, in one of
+those absurd rushes after an idea to make plausible a consciously
+absurd utterance, "I suppose it sort of--they sort of--"
+
+"Yes, you're right," rejoined Japers, fully believing that he and
+Nelson between them could outwit most theatrical critics.  The gardener
+and his assistant blathered away until Miss Japers was obliged to float
+her ribbons out of the front door in a dazzling hint that the family
+party was ready.
+
+The Japers did not wait for Evan to dress; Lizzie was constrained to do
+so, but her mother looked so uncomfortably fussed up that the girl had
+compassion, and left the romantic excitement of a bankclerk's presence
+for the less alluring sensation of Hamilton's main street.
+
+An hour or so later Evan sauntered up town.  He did not feel exactly
+lonesome, there by himself in the Saturday crowds, but rather out of
+his environment.  It seemed strange to him to have no immediate task on
+hand, to have nothing to balance or look up.  His mind felt almost
+vacant, for want of something to burden it; but the vacant feeling was,
+oh, such a relief!  Only the weary clerk can understand this thing; he
+knows so well what it means to carry a burden with him on a pleasure
+trip.  "Pleasure" is not the adjective to qualify such a trip, where
+trees and flowers are decked with figures and where the mind sees
+phantoms of accumulated and accumulating work, waiting, waiting like
+Fate.  Stories have been told of criminals carrying the body of a
+victim around on their backs until they stood on the brink of insanity.
+Hundreds of bankboys know what it is to feel the weight of corpse-like
+figures on their backs.  One cannot get away from the horrible burden,
+it clings until the heart is sick and the stomach nauseated.  And these
+monsters are not victims of the bankclerk's, either; the clerk is their
+victim; nor does he in any way merit the unnatural attachment--someone
+else digs them out of their graves (the bank "morgue" of accumulated
+back-work) for plunder, and saddles them on him.....
+
+Evan's mind felt vacant; that was much better than having it loaded
+with worry, worry that could result in nothing but harm to the clerk
+and nothing but cold dollars to the bank.
+
+The young ex-banker refreshed himself with a solitary sundae and then
+took steps in the direction of a theatre advertising the old drama,
+"East Lynne."  He bought an economic half-dollar seat and entered while
+the orchestra was playing one of the reddest rags out.  He had read
+"Mrs. Henry Wood's" great book, but he searched his memory in vain for
+a clue to the propriety of ragtime as a preface to the story.
+
+A moment before the curtain lifted a girl came into the theatre and was
+ushered to a lonesome seat beside Evan.  He was, gardener fashion,
+watching for his money's worth, and paid no attention to the person
+beside him until first intermission, when a squint told him that here
+was someone very like Hazel Morton of Mt. Alban.  Then he looked fully
+into her eyes and held out his hand.  She seemed surprised.
+
+"Don't you know me, Miss Morton?"
+
+"Why--I'm afraid--why, yes I do!"
+
+They regarded each other a minute.
+
+"You seem to have changed, Hazel!"
+
+He was sorry he had said it.  She blushed and did not look him squarely
+in the face as she replied:
+
+"Hard work."
+
+Evan sat wondering, in silence.  Hazel had had a nice home in Mt.
+Alban.  Had she run away from it?  And how was it that she looked so
+subdued?--she used to be a vivacious creature, fond of dresses and
+gaiety.  Now she wore a plain white waist and a skirt of cheap blue
+serge.  The Mt. Alban color was gone, and pensiveness dusked her
+intelligent face.
+
+It was, doubtless, to break the embarrassing silence creeping between
+them that Hazel asked Evan if he worked hard in Hamilton.  How long had
+he been in that branch of the bank?
+
+"I'll tell you after the show," he answered, "if you'll have dinner
+with me at the ---- Hotel.  We can go for a paddle afterwards."
+
+She smiled and said it was very kind of him and that she would just
+love to spend the evening in that way.
+
+In the second act Evan noticed that Hazel wiped her eyes frequently
+with a miniature handkerchief.  He felt like doing it himself in the
+next act, and Hazel sobbed audibly.  Of course, she was not the only
+weeping woman at that matinee.
+
+At dinner a glow of the girl's old-time color came back, and with it a
+charm that Evan had noticed in her eyes at Mt. Alban dances, when a
+certain bankclerk was hovering near.
+
+"Do you know what a boarding-house appetite is, Ev--Mr.--?"
+
+"Did you say 'Mr.'?  I've been calling you 'Hazel,' you know."
+
+She laughed.  "I meant 'Evan.'"
+
+Evan suddenly recalled the last time he had bandied names with a Mt.
+Alban girl.
+
+"Yes," he replied, "you bet I do.  But I'm eating farm-meals now."
+
+She looked surprised, and he told her about resigning from the bank,
+"because the work was too hard," and about coming to the Fruit Belt to
+recreate.
+
+"You're what I call a sensible boy, Evan....  I wish....."
+
+Hazel did not finish her wish.  She blushed instead.
+
+"You don't know how good it seems to meet you here like this, Hazel,"
+Nelson observed, to relieve the situation.  He knew perfectly well that
+her wish was about Bill Watson.
+
+"I don't think you can enjoy it half so well as I."
+
+"Why?"  His question was curious, but thoughtless.
+
+"Well--I'm lonesome," she hesitated; "I hardly ever go out--except when
+Billy comes over."
+
+It was out at last, and then they became more intimate.  As they walked
+down the street to the wharf, later, Hazel pressed his arm and cried
+softly:
+
+"Did you see that?  Don't you know her?"
+
+"You mean the girl that just passed--the one in green?  I was just
+thinking--wondering if that could be Sadie Hall, Alfy Castle's girl."
+
+"That's who it was."
+
+"Why didn't she speak, Hazel?"
+
+The girl looked up into his eyes as she answered:
+
+"I've met her on the street several times.  First time I was with
+Billy, who had come over for a visit.  Sadie nodded, and went on with
+the friend, at whose home here she is visiting.  The second time I was
+standing in front of a confectionery talking to a girl who--well, who
+hasn't a very good name in Hamilton; but she works where I do, and
+anyway I would not snub her for the world."
+
+"And Miss Hall has stopped speaking entirely, eh?"
+
+Hazel smiled impishly.
+
+"I gave her a fine chance to turn up her nose just now; I winked at
+her."
+
+Evan laughed until his companion caught the contagion.
+
+"They're well mated, Hazel--Castle and she."
+
+"Yes, indeed."
+
+When they were skimming through the bay in a canoe, Miss Morton's mind
+again reverted to Castle.
+
+"Hasn't he always been a snob?" she asked.
+
+"Don't mention him--it makes me sick to think of him.  He takes it
+after his uncle, I think."
+
+Nevertheless, Evan kept on thinking about the Castles, as he faced
+Hazel in the canoe, until at last and by degrees his story came out.
+
+"Oh, the criminals!" cried Hazel.  "Why do so many boys put up with
+it!....  Evan," she said earnestly, after a pause, "you have confided
+in me, now I want to confide in you."  A canoe, it is said, affects
+people like that.
+
+"It's something about Billy," she continued.  "Will you tell me what I
+want to know?"
+
+"If you ought to know, Hazel."
+
+"Well, I should....  I--he--"  The tears filled her eyes, and she
+seemed undecided whether to give them vent or wipe them away and be
+brave.  She wiped them away.
+
+"I left a good home and came here to work just so that I could be near
+him and help him.  I've told him that I'll wait as long as I need to.
+I didn't want to go to Toronto, because I knew everyone in Mt. Alban
+would then say I tagged Billy.  I'm willing to wait, but Billy seems so
+discouraged at times I am often afraid he'll run away or do something
+rash.  Tell me, Evan, is he all right?  Does he drink or--anything?"
+
+Evan tried to recall something Bill had said that would cheer the
+waiting girl, but could not think of anything.  He did remember the
+lectures Watson had delivered on the follies of clerkship; but to Hazel
+they would only indicate recklessness and dissatisfaction.  And, too,
+Bill did take a drink frequently; in fact, Evan suspected that he made
+a night of it occasionally to "drown his sorrow."
+
+"Hazel," he said seriously, "Bill is one of the finest fellows I ever
+worked with.  I'm sure he's honest and true.  He hates Castle and
+Castle hates him: that's something to his credit--but it may keep him
+back in the bank.  But he'll never be false to a friend or a girl, I'm
+sure of that."
+
+The girl in the canoe looked wistfully at Nelson.  "Somehow I wish you
+were working in the same office with him.  I always felt as though you
+were--a solid sort of a chap, Evan."
+
+The last few words were accompanied by a little laugh, to counteract
+the suspicion of flattery that clung to them.  But for that feminine
+interpretation Evan might not have so fully appreciated her meaning.
+He got a suggestion from her words: would it not be a good idea to
+write Bill and tell him of the evening spent with Hazel?  It might give
+the slaving city-teller new vim for the eternity of figures and
+celibacy before him.
+
+On Sunday Evan did write to Watson.  He described Saturday's pleasure
+excursions with Hazel, dwelling on the enjoyment it gave himself and
+upon the sincerity with which she spoke of "Billy."  Evan meant the
+letter to appeal.  He knew that Bill knew him and would not resent
+perfect candor, when properly mixed with the right brand of sympathy.
+He thought, as he wrote, of the peculiar independence of character and
+cynicism of Watson; the combined traits amounting almost to
+recklessness.  But he could not conceive of Bill's going wrong.  He
+reflected that Hazel must love Bill, in spite of her fear that he was
+weak, and wondered at the tenderness of woman.  Why was she so little
+considered in this world of business?
+
+The Morton girl's companionship, quite naturally, took Nelson back to
+Mt. Alban, and Mt. Alban was only a few miles from Hometon and Frankie.
+He did not consider it likely that Julia Watersea or Lily Allen were
+still thinking of him; but he sighed when a vision of Frankie, with
+blue skirt and cheap white waist like Hazel's, rose before him.  He
+wrote her a letter, the first in months, wishing her well, but saying
+nothing of love.  A dollar a day with board wasn't much, truly, to
+apply against the great debit of matrimony, and why mention love at all
+if it could not be consummated?
+
+To Robb, the vegetable-man also wrote, and to A. P. Henty at his home
+village.
+
+Sunday night Lizzie Japers again fluttered her ribbons, and dropped a
+hint about church.  Afraid of losing his job, Evan accepted the bait
+and walked with the fair Liz toward the altar.  It must have been hard
+for the organist to keep his fingers off a wedding march when he saw,
+in his mirror, the pair walking up the aisle.
+
+Days sped again.  June was come.  Blossoms were falling and berries
+grew larger on the vines and bushes.  A forwarded note came from
+Hometon, rejoicing in the promotion Mrs. Nelson had read between the
+lines of her son's letter, and in the miraculous recuperation spoken
+of.  Lou had enclosed a slip of paper confiding to her brother the
+opinion that she should have a fellow, being now eighteen, and asking
+him to seek out an eligible and bring him home for the summer holidays.
+There was no word from Frankie.  A fat, scrawly letter came from Henty.
+
+"Dear Evan," it said, "after you left Banfield, old Penton was like a
+bear-cat.  He tore around the office like something with the pip, took
+to chewing tobacco and spitting in the waste-baskets, and raised proper
+---- with the pups.  He came up to me one day with Uncle Harry looking
+out of his eyes and gave me a short biography of myself.  I stood it as
+long as I could, and then I seemed to be pitching in an exciting ball
+game.  My right hand shot out, and before I knew it Penton was lying
+down at my feet.  When he got up he almost cried, and tried to tell me
+he was just fooling.  I noticed that night that the guns were missing
+from the cage drawer, and fearing that Penton had them in store for me,
+I packed my grip and beat it.  A fellow's foolish to take a chance with
+a guy like W. W.  My father was glad to have me home.  He consulted a
+lawyer about my bond, and the lawyer said the bank wouldn't dare do
+anything about it under the circumstances; he said it would make too
+much of a stir and would hurt business.  I imagine they'll fire Penton
+over the head of it; but I hope Filter doesn't lose his job--it would
+kill him.  I wish you were farming like me; it feels mighty good after
+office work.  Write soon.  A. P."
+
+When his muscles had grown until he felt the vigor of school days
+returning, Evan began to look higher than rhubarb and asparagus tops;
+he even looked beyond the Mountain, and saw himself in an easy chair
+with a telephone at his elbow and a stenographer in front of him.  He
+wrote an answer to quite a few advertisements in Toronto papers; those
+to which he got a reply asked for references, as did those written in
+answer to his own insertions.  Disgusted, he stopped advertising and
+answering ads.
+
+"By Japers," he said to himself one day, "I'll beat it to
+Buffalo--there are no Canadian Banks over there!"
+
+The idea took root in him.  Also, he was counselled to leave the happy
+home of the Hamilton gardener by the actions of Elizabeth.  She not
+only persisted in her cream-and-sugar attentions, but wheedled the
+"hired man" into taking her places, and finally began to speak of him
+as her "friend."  Evan was willing to be friendly with most people, but
+the significant proprietorship implied in the tone with which Liz said
+"friend" was extremely discomfiting.  The ex-clerk saw plainly that he
+must make a get-away.
+
+Toronto offered nothing, neither did Hamilton; they were both bank
+strongholds.  Buffalo, on the other hand, was in another country--a
+country to which almost every young Canadian turns his face, if not his
+steps, at one time or another.  It was free from Canadian influence, a
+new world in fact, and yet only a short distance away.  Inquiring at
+the ticket office as to fare, Evan learned that in two days there was
+an excursion to New York for only twice as much as the regular fare to
+Buffalo.  New York!  The name suggested adventure.  Why not go there
+instead of Buffalo?  It was only a night's or a day's journey from
+Toronto!
+
+New York it would be!  Evan sent the news sailing to Henty and Robb,
+but not home.  Hometon would find it out when he had a position in the
+American metropolis.  He called and bade Hazel Morton good-bye, and
+insisted on taking her out to the theatre.  On their way home they
+dropped into a cafe for ice-cream.  Again they met Miss Hall of Mt.
+Alban.  She stared hard at Evan while he was not looking, and kept
+whispering to her lady companion.
+
+"We don't care, Hazel, do we?" said Nelson.
+
+Miss Morton smiled:
+
+"What if she should go back to the Mount and tell Julia?"
+
+Evan felt his heart sink.
+
+"Hazel," he said, with awe, "you're not serious, are you?"
+
+"Are you, Evan?"
+
+"No.  Why, I haven't heard from her in months."
+
+The Morton girl looked at him in surprise.
+
+"Do you think," she asked, wide-eyed, "that months mean anything to a
+woman?"
+
+He showed his distress unmistakably.  Hazel at last began to laugh,
+softly, with increasing merriment.
+
+"My dear boy," she said, "what a serious fellow you are!  The girl who
+falls in love with you for good and all, well--"
+
+He gazed at her questioningly, gradually feeling a load leave him, a
+load that he did not know he carried.  Hazel was speaking:
+
+"Julia had a habit of juggling with bankers' hearts.  She's married
+now, you know."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+_IN THE COUNTRY OF OUR COUSINS._
+
+Hall's lawn was decorated with Japanese lanterns.  The little Mt. Alban
+boys who passed in the dusk wondered if the time would ever come in
+their lives when they should be eligible for a real garden-party.  Such
+a wondrous condition seemed very far off, like Heaven.  And the little
+girls who passed peeked through the hedge, like fairies seeking
+admittance to a nymph gathering.  There was no music as yet, for the
+evening had scarcely set in, but the tables were set and the lanterns
+threw a glimmer over the flower-beds and through the trees.
+
+The party was, ostensibly, a welcome to the newly-married couple, James
+and Julia Watersea Simpson; actually it was to announce that Miss Sadie
+Hall had returned from Hamilton to accept the boredom of Mt. Alban
+again for a little season.
+
+It is not for this bank story to enter upon details of that garden
+party; to spy on the sons of villagers behind dark balsams devouring
+cigarettes borrowed from the village cut-up; to play dictagraph to the
+gossips, or to hang around where the girls are chattering.  However,
+there were characters at that lawn social more or less concerned in our
+story, and of whom we therefore ought to make mention.
+
+Those characters occupied a place of prominence at the function, being
+seated close to Miss Hall herself.  She was paying them flattering
+attention.
+
+"Mr. Perry," she said, smilingly, "who would have thought you were
+going to turn out such a sport?"
+
+Far from being offended, Porter grinned gleefully, and incidentally
+wondered where the money was coming from to pay the rent of the
+roadster that had brought him up to see his Hometon girl visiting in
+Mt. Alban.
+
+"Well," he replied, "I never was what you'd call a willy, eh?"
+
+"No," said Sadie, "but--well, you were so young, you know."
+
+Porter's "girl" was talking in a low tone with a new bank junior who
+was beginning to realize what a juvenile and unromantic affair school
+had been.  Sadie nudged Perry.
+
+"You want to watch out," she whispered, so that the others could hear,
+"or you'll be losing your friend."
+
+Frankie Arling blushed.  The junior did too.
+
+"N-n-no danger," he stammered, without knowing exactly what he said.
+
+"Why no danger?" asked Miss Hall, anxious to say something interesting.
+
+For answer the junior looked at Perry with the deference due a teller.
+Porter pouted--not like a child, but like a pigeon.
+
+"Have some ice-cream, girls," he suggested, determined to convert the
+junior's respect into awe.
+
+No one declining, the "porter" played a part long before assigned him
+in the Mt. Alban bank, and brought back a tray that had cost him eighty
+cents.
+
+"Do you remember, Miss Hall," he said, to still a beating of the heart
+occasioned by the admiring glances of two strange girls in the circle,
+"the social we had here just two years ago?"
+
+"Oh, yes," replied Sadie, after pretending to look backward through a
+great many sumptuous entertainments; "yes."
+
+"All the boys were here.  There was Bill Watson, myself, Mr. Castle,
+Nel--"
+
+"Yes, that reminds me," interrupted Sadie, "I saw Mr. Nelson on the
+street in Hamilton the other day, and met him again in a cafe.  Both
+times he was with--"
+
+Sadie hesitated.  Frankie was looking astonishedly at her.
+
+"Why, Ev--Mr. Nelson hasn't been moved, has he?"
+
+The question and the expression of voice behind it seemed to give Sadie
+an idea.
+
+"I forgot--he comes from your town, does he not, Miss Arling?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who was he with?" asked Perry, stupidly, "anyone we know?"
+
+"Why--yes.  Hazel Morton."
+
+Frankie's question was not answered; but now she did not care to have
+it answered.  She had been in Mt. Alban three days, therefore she had
+heard all about the Morton girl leaving a nice home to "be in a city
+where she can act as she likes,"--which, Mt. Alban females ruled, was
+wickedly.
+
+It takes a girl, and especially one of Sadie Hall's stamp, to notice
+embarrassment or disappointment in another girl.  Frankie was rather
+silent and downcast.  She never talked much at any time, but even to
+Perry, with whom she was sometimes quite speechless, she seemed more
+than commonly quiet during the remainder of the evening.  Of course,
+Porter may have been considerably on the alert.
+
+"Is she related to him or anything?" Sadie asked Perry, on the side.
+
+"Well--no," he hesitated; "their families are old friends, though."
+
+"I could tell her something very interesting about him," replied Sadie;
+"he's been dismissed from the bank."
+
+"What!"
+
+"Sh-sh!  Alfred wrote me about it.  And that's not the worst of
+it--he's suspected of being a crook."
+
+"For G--'s sake!" murmured Perry; and thought a while.
+
+"Had I better tell her?" asked Sadie.
+
+"I guess so; she'll soon find out, anyway."
+
+Miss Hall found Frankie admiring a flower-bed, lonesomely, and
+approached her with the news she had.  She knew that her Alfred hated
+Evan, who in his turn hated Alfred, and it was quite a satisfaction to
+circulate the truth about an enemy when it was unpleasant.  To give her
+credit, Sadie was rather sorry she had done it, when she saw the effect
+produced on Frankie.
+
+The following day Miss Hall met the girl whom Frankie Arling, of
+Hometon, had been visiting.
+
+"Where's your friend?" she asked.
+
+"Gone," replied the other girl.  "She took it into her head to go home
+on the noon train, and we couldn't coax her out of it.  I think she was
+lonesome."
+
+"No doubt," replied Sadie, abstractedly.
+
+Mrs. Nelson sat reading a letter, with tears in her eyes; another
+letter lay on the table.  The one she read was from a woman-friend in
+Toronto.  One paragraph of it puzzled Mrs. Nelson; it read: "One of the
+bankboys who boards here told me that your son had been discharged from
+the S---- Bank on suspicion.  I think my boarder has made a mistake; he
+declares it was Evan Nelson of Hometon, though.  Let me hear from you,
+Caroline, for I'm anxious to know that there has been a blunder."
+
+The letter on the table was from Evan; one of those garden compositions
+sent through Sam Robb.  It spoke about health, a good time and good
+board.
+
+Frankie and Lou entered the kitchen where Mrs. Nelson sat in misery.
+She showed them the letter from Evan and the other one from Toronto.
+Frankie was silent, but Lou exclaimed:
+
+"Why, mother!  I'm surprised!  Do you think for a minute that Evan
+would deceive us like that?"
+
+"I can't believe it, dear; but what am I to do?"
+
+"There's a mistake somewhere," replied Lou; "why, even if they have
+fired him it's all a mistake.  'On suspicion'--imagine!  Why brother
+wouldn't take a--a--"
+
+The thought was too much for Lou.  What with lonesomeness for her
+brother and anger at the mere thought of anyone suspecting him, she
+gave way to a June storm.
+
+Frankie was not free from signs of lamentation, either.  She filled up
+more and more until there were raindrops from that quarter, too, and
+Sadie Hall's story came out.
+
+Mrs. Nelson was overcome.  Why had not her boy written about the
+trouble?
+
+"Oh, Louie," she cried, "it's terrible!  They suspect him of stealing!
+And he's discharged!  Whatever are we to do?"
+
+Lou raised her lovely face and forced a smile.
+
+"Mother, dear," she said, "you know what a fellow Evan is.  He doesn't
+want us to know about it until the thing is straightened out.  It must
+straighten out, because we know he isn't guilty."
+
+Such is a sister's logic.  Mrs. Nelson telephoned her husband to come
+up at once.  He came, and was told the news.
+
+"Good!" he said.
+
+"Why, George, how can you say that?  They've ruined our boy."
+
+Mrs. Nelson was taking it badly.
+
+"Tut tut," said her husband, kindly, "don't get all worked up about it.
+He'll come around.  There'll be an explanation from him some of these
+days.  Jerusalem! but I'm glad he's out of it.  I knew he'd get a
+lesson.  Blast the banks!"
+
+After this mild explosion Nelson walked to the water-pail and drank a
+dipper of water.
+
+"But what's he doing in Hamilton?" asked the mother.
+
+"That's only a fifty-cent trip from Toronto," answered Nelson; "the lad
+was probably over for a boat-ride."
+
+"Well, what's he doing now?"
+
+"I've got no more idea than you have, Carrie.  But he won't do anything
+desperate, be sure of that.  If he gets down-and-out he knows we're
+here."
+
+At last Mrs. Nelson was consoled.  She made her husband wire Evan at
+Toronto to come home.  The telegraph operator surmised enough from the
+telegram to invent a story; it was supplemented by whisperings from Mt.
+Alban; and eventually the town gabs were wondering where Evan could
+have deposited the $50,000 he stole.
+
+Besides the telegram, George Nelson sent a letter, telling his son not
+to worry, and enclosing a cheque for fifty dollars.  Frankie Arling, in
+her little room at home, also wrote a letter:
+
+
+"Dear Evan,--We have heard that you are out of the bank.  I think you
+were foolish to ever go into it.  There are ridiculous rumors floating
+around that you were dismissed on suspicion.  I know they're not true,
+and everybody else does; but still we are surprised you didn't write
+home something about it.
+
+"I don't suppose Hometon matters very much to you any more.  The town
+is not so dull as it used to be, though.  There is a new bunch of
+bankboys here, and we have plenty of good times.  Mr. Perry rents a car
+occasionally and gives us girls a ride.  He surely is a good-hearted
+chap.  We all like him.
+
+"You will be surprised when I tell you that he has proposed to me.  I
+don't think he'll ever make much money, but he'll always be free with
+what he has, and mighty good to a girl.  He wants me to visit in London
+during summer vacation; he lives there.  If I go he says he'll see that
+I meet a nice crowd.  I haven't asked mother yet.
+
+"I guess you won't be coming home for vacation this summer, now you're
+out of the bank.  It wouldn't be like you to come back a failure.  It
+seems funny that you shouldn't have got along in banking as well as
+Porter: you are just as smart as he is.  That fellow surprises me
+sometimes, though!  I've been at him to quit the bank and go into
+something else.  He shouldn't be proposing on six hundred dollars a
+year, should he?  Well, good-bye.  Yours sincerely,
+
+"FRANK."
+
+
+After signing the letter Frankie dropped the pen and rested her chin on
+her hands.  She gazed into space until the tears rolled down her
+cheeks; then she hid her face lest the looking-glass might see her.
+
+"To think," she murmured, "that Evan sees girls like _that_!"
+
+Girl-like, she had said nothing about Hamilton or Hazel Morton in the
+letter.  She wanted to wound.  Perry had helped her make Evan jealous
+once before.  She was afraid mention of Hamilton would call forth
+explanations from Evan, and she didn't want him to explain.  Even
+though he were innocent, she felt that she must hate him now, for she
+was jealous.
+
+
+While the Mt. Alban garden party was in progress Evan attended one in
+New York--the Madison Square Garden party.  There were no Chinese
+lanterns in evidence (although there were some Chinese), and the
+creatures who participated were not particularly young or care-free:
+there were the burning lights of Broadway and the Square, and wretched
+figures huddling on, beside, and under, the benches.
+
+"And this is New York!" murmured Evan.
+
+The melancholy sight fascinated him; he found it hard to leave Madison
+Gardens, although the White Way called to the youth and love of gaiety
+within him.  He had never before seen so plainly the line of
+demarcation between sunlight and shadow.  The startling proximity of
+riches to poverty, gladness to sadness, shocked him; he had a vague
+fear of something, he did not know what.  Maybe it was the readjustment
+to come.
+
+It is quite evident, from his loitering, that Evan was not worrying
+about himself.  He had a job, therefore he sat and pitied those who did
+not have--and who did not want--work.  Realizing at last that it was
+folly to pity without aiding, and that he was too poor to actually aid
+the wretches around him, he wandered across to Fifth Avenue and stared
+in the windows of a book store.
+
+He had come to "town" (his room was in Brooklyn) with the intention of
+seeing a play, but the Madison garden party had taken away his breath,
+and left him without a desire to squander money on himself, when he had
+deliberately held it back from the hungry and the naked.  Further
+reflection brought about a reaction in his mind, and eventually he
+compromised with himself by going to a ten-cent picture show.
+Afterwards he took subway and surface cars back to Eastern Parkway and
+found himself sitting thoughtfully in his little room.
+
+Like a writer who gets "copy" on the streets and fixes it up in his
+garret, Evan thought the environment of his room would help him to
+arrange the impressions a trip to town had created, but--again like the
+writer--he found his head so full of notions that he could not think,
+and he understood perfectly that ideas apart from thought were poor
+things.  So he turned in, bidding Madison Square and memories of
+Hometon good-night.
+
+Quite early next morning he arose, fresh and eager, all vain
+philosophizing gone, prepared to hold his own in a big city.  New York
+had not, from the moment he landed, frightened him.  Like the child
+that looks into the fire, he saw only wonders.  He had his health back,
+he knew he was a good bookkeeper, board in New York was cheap--why
+worry?  He hadn't worried, and he had got work first crack!  It is not
+hard to get a job in New York, unless you are in rags; but it is hard
+to get a good salary.
+
+For a week now Evan had been engaged.  The cashier, Phillips, told him
+he was going to be a good man for the firm.  Phillips did not ask him
+where he had received his training: New Yorkers have no time for
+life-stories or autobiographies.  Evan was surprised that they did not
+ask him more about himself, and for recommendations.  Instead of
+saying: "What are your references, sir?" the boss had said: "What can
+you do?"
+
+"I'm a bookkeeper."
+
+"What experience?"
+
+"Two years and a half in Canadian banking."
+
+"Sounds good.  What made you come over here?"
+
+"Like every young Canadian," replied Evan, "I wanted to see New York."
+
+Conscious of no guilt, he felt bold and spoke without fear.
+
+"Well," replied the employer, "we'll give you a chance."
+
+"Do you want a recommendation?" asked the Canadian.
+
+"Nah," grunted the boss; "what good is that?  If you can deliver the
+goods, all right; if you can't, out you go.  As for your honesty, we
+depend on our ability to read character; after all, wouldn't you rather
+have your own opinion of a fellow than somebody else's?  If ever you
+get to be cashier here we'll know you all right; not from Toronto
+references, but from daily observation.  We learn to spot honesty here
+in Noo Yo'k: it's so dawn rare."
+
+Evan smiled in spite of a desire to look solemn.  He liked the "old
+man," and knew work with him would be pleasant.  The office staff he
+liked, too, for they were free and easy, though mightily busy.  It was
+a great change from the bank.  No one seemed to be afraid of anybody
+else.  The cashier was no bullier; although there was occasional
+friction, there was no subordination.
+
+Everybody worked fast, but, for Evan, there was not the strain of a
+Canadian city bank.  He knew there was no Alfred Castle watching him,
+and he knew that if a ledger went wrong requiring night work, the man
+who worked on it would be paid for every minute of overtime.  Already
+he made fifteen dollars a week, and that was just as big as fifteen
+dollars would be in Toronto--it was bigger; it would buy more food and
+pleasure in New York than in any other city on the continent.  Evan
+found it ample.
+
+"If you keep on," said the cashier one day, "we'll be giving you more
+work to do."
+
+Evan was surprised, and gratified.  "I'll keep on," he said.
+
+A few days after determining to keep on he asked for a half-day off to
+humor a headache.  He was allowed an afternoon's leave.
+
+On the way down to the ocean beach, where he hoped to soothe his
+palpitating cerebellum, he called at the Brooklyn room and found two
+letters and a telegram awaiting him.  They had been forwarded by Sam,
+who had scribbled on the back of the telegram: "I knew you would have
+it in a few hours or I would have re-despatched the message."  Evan
+smiled at his mother's anxiety--a letter had gone to her explaining
+everything; he had told her he was afraid his father would want to
+fight the bank in the courts, so he had kept the matter quiet until
+another position turned up.  "No one ever wins in a suit against the
+bank," he said, "and Dad needs his money."
+
+The cheque from home for fifty dollars looked good to Evan, but he
+hesitated before accepting it.  Suddenly, however, he recollected a few
+little Ontario debts, and slipping the cheque in his pocket he thought
+what an unbusinesslike father he had.  He sent a special letter of
+thanks, just as he would have done to any benefactor; he was not of the
+persuasion that everything is coming to the man who happens to be a son.
+
+As a child saves the best bite of cake till the last, the New York
+clerk stowed Frankie's letter in his pocket until he reached Coney
+Island.  He opened it as he sat on the sand, not far away from a group
+of attractive girls.  Frankie's mention of Perry caused Evan to take
+note of a chilly breeze that was blowing over the surf.  When the
+letter persisted and persisted in Porter, he suddenly thought the sun
+was mighty hot for June.
+
+"Let her have him," the reader muttered; "she's welcome to him!"
+
+Evan tried to make himself believe he had meant to say: "Let _him_ have
+_her_," but that was not what he had said, and he knew it.  He knew,
+too, that he could not coax himself to say it.
+
+"She makes me mad," he muttered again; "what does she see in that mutt?
+Confound my head, what's the matter with it, anyway?"
+
+Tearing the letter to bits, he ran into the surf.  The girls had been
+watching him read and had been laughing over the expression on his
+face.  They followed him into the water, and one of them managed to
+slip over the ropes beside him.  The others made a fuss; and, not being
+used to swimming flirtations, Evan thought a real accident had
+happened.  He bravely swam under the rope and rescued the water-nymph.
+An hour later, when they were all acquainted, he discovered that she
+could out-do him thrice over as a swimmer.  But he was glad to know
+somebody in big, busy New York, and Ethel Harris was both pretty and
+smart.
+
+Thus it was that the ex-bankclerk came to pass over Frankie Arling's
+letter, which had hurt him, and to take an interest in the pleasures of
+the present.  Frankie and Perry, like the Past, were gone into eclipse.
+
+In the course of months Evan became fairly familiar with New York, and
+with Miss Harris.  The city stood scrutiny, and the girl--she was
+mighty fine.  There was this difference between Ethel and New York,
+however: she was fathomable, as a girl should not be, and the city was
+not.  Madison Square always reminded Evan of a dream he had dreamt in
+every fever of childhood--a nightmare in which a great wheel ran
+smoothly and little wheels crookedly; ran until the sleeper's brain was
+ready to burst with a sort of frenzy.
+
+The people of New York turned out to be like the people of Toronto--and
+Hometon.  Some were clever, and some were ignorant and dull.  All of
+them were trying to make a living (except the predatory class) just as
+the farmers in Ontario were.  Young men fell in love with girls and
+married them (occasionally), three meals a day were eaten, and sleep
+was popular.
+
+And yet there was something about New York that was new and mysterious;
+its life was extraordinarily exhilarating.  So many ten-thousands went
+to work and came from work every day at the same hours, it was like
+gazing upon the Creation to watch them.  They lost their individuality,
+their human, insignificant (?) individuality, in the mass, and became a
+part of Adam's seed.  Country people were less interesting than these
+New Yorkers, because country people were more independent.  New Yorkers
+never looked at each other, but they felt each other; the atoms of the
+great mass, though separated by never-closing spaces, were held
+together by an eternal potentiality.  There was a sympathy in the mass
+of city-folk, unspoken and even unobserved by many, but mighty--it was
+much more wonderful than the simple, verbal friendship between Jake
+Zeigler and Mat Carrol, neighbors at Bill's Corners.  The power that
+held the atoms of the great mass together was the very same that gave
+each atom its individuality.  Evan was impressed with the magnetism of
+New York, but he did not comprehend its strength.  He came across atoms
+that had strayed off gradually, and been drawn back like lightning; but
+he understood but vaguely how the force operated, and why.  In fact,
+who does understand?
+
+The life he led, which was the New York life, kept the Canadian
+ex-clerk stimulated to a point beyond his power of physical resistance;
+he worked harder than the cashier wanted him to work.  Those crowds
+that surged in every thoroughfare seemed to be behind him pushing him,
+and he could not take things easy.  The strain was telling on him,
+though he tried to convince himself that it was not.  Probably the lure
+of a great city would have held him up to the point of a break-down,
+had not a letter from his father set him thinking thoughts that changed
+his life once more.
+
+"When you build a house, Evan," said the letter, "you always want to
+have a solid foundation.  So it is with a career.  I hope you will,
+after a while, find your niche--I'm quite sure you have not found it
+yet.  But don't worry--you'll get there: you have Grandpa Nelson in you.
+
+"P.S.--I forgot to tell you that the bank's guarantee company and the
+general manager of the bank itself have dunned me for your part of the
+Banfield loss, fifty dollars.  I laughed at them and told them to sue."
+
+The postscript took Evan's mind back.  It caused a burning in him that
+he knew must some day flare up.  Unable to quench the resentment that
+filled him he bought some fruit and ate it as he walked along Wall
+Street, westward.
+
+"Great heavens!" he muttered, waving his hand toward the marble halls
+of finance around him, "my country's got you backed into East River
+when it comes to a combination of Trusts!"
+
+A few minutes after muttering this soliloquy he was in the crowds on
+Broad Street, directly opposite the Stock Exchange.  A newsy thrust a
+paper into his hand, which he took and glanced at automatically.  The
+first thing to catch his eye was a small headline over a news-item in
+one corner of the front page:
+
+"CANADIAN BANKCLERK SUICIDES."
+
+
+Evan felt his heart stop and a sickening shudder ran through him as he
+read:
+
+"Because he lost at the races and could not return money secretly
+borrowed from his cash, Sidney Levison, of the S---- Bank, Toronto,
+shot himself last night."
+
+
+Of all the many thousands of New Yorkers who read that paragraph Evan
+Nelson, perhaps, was the only one who fully comprehended the meaning of
+it.  He saw, as in a looking-glass, the gloomy series of steps down
+which the teller had come to where he lay, a suicide.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+_FAR-AWAY GREEN FIELDS._
+
+A germ began to work in Evan's mind.  It must have been some relation
+to the garden-grubs that had infested Jim Japers' vineyard, for it
+showed a predilection for fresh air and outside work.  Two
+incidents--the firing by the cashier of a clerk ahead of Nelson, and
+the receiving of a letter from A. P. Henty--did not help matters any.
+
+Henty's handwriting had such a substantial appearance it seemed to
+indicate that some men were blessed with big fists to fall back on in
+case their fingers lost employment.  A. P.'s composition, too, was
+solid and matter-of-fact; there were no flourishes, except occasional
+slang; the letter was plainly the product of a free mind and a steady
+nerve.
+
+When the clerk who was discharged approached Evan with a smile and
+said: "Well, kiddo, you're next in line," Evan wondered why the fellow
+was so unconcerned about it.  He asked him.
+
+"Oh," answered the clerk, "we're used to that here, in New York.  A
+fellow can always land another job.  I usually manage to get the hook
+about twice a year; the work gets monotonous, and I suppose I lose
+ambish."
+
+Evan wondered where one would get to under those circumstances.  If he
+had stayed in the big city nine years instead of nine months he would
+have ceased to wonder about position hunters; they would have become a
+distinct element in urban life.  As it was, the impression he received
+was quite true to the actual condition of affairs: a large city was a
+very precarious place.
+
+However, the Canadian decided to stay in New York for the winter
+anyway; it was lively then, he was told, with the presence of returned
+"seasoners" and other summer absentees.  He asked the cashier for
+promotion, and received it, along with two dollars increase in salary.
+He made up his mind to save five dollars a week; he could live and have
+considerable pleasure on the other twelve dollars.
+
+Mardi Gras was over; not a straw hat was to be seen; the mornings grew
+chilly; theatres were in full swing.  Then Miss Harris got Evan in with
+a "crowd"; the department stores hauled out their Christmas things; and
+with the first flurry of snow the whole town slid into winter.
+
+The New York winter looked, at first, like a bluff.  The man from
+Canada refused to wear an overcoat until one day a breeze came sweeping
+over the Atlantic and took him in hand; after that he had great respect
+for the climate.
+
+Ethel Harris made good as a comrade.  She knew how to keep things
+going.  Evan was astonished at the ease with which he mixed in things;
+the boys seemed to have a way of fixing up that he could hardly catch,
+but they were a jovial bunch.  An odd one was after the order of
+Castle, but most of them resembled Bill Watson in manner.  The girls
+all expected to marry Riverside Drive property owners, but aside from
+that they were sane and congenial.  Evan knew about how much money they
+made, and consequently took considerable delight in their
+exaggerations.  They were practically all stenographers.
+
+It takes New Yorkers to be friendly.  The city is so big it resembles
+the world.  In it there are as many countries as the world boasts, and
+when the members of a social set meet they come like so many travellers
+from the ends of the earth, bringing stories with them that Park Row
+reporters never hear about.  There is real life and entertainment in a
+gathering of young Manhattanites.
+
+Evan took great pleasure in those parties.  Often he danced with some
+girl who had gone on the stage (for about one performance), and there
+was considerable romance in that.  As the winter passed he wondered if
+he really wanted to leave those friends and that gaiety.  Ethel treated
+him so well he was glad to spend all his spare money on her, at
+theatres, suppers and so on.  But he always put away the five dollars a
+week just the same.  He was led to believe that not many New York lads
+did that much for their future.
+
+In February a Southerner came on the scene.  The first night of his
+reception in the crowd he succeeded in breaking the hearts of half the
+girls; the other half succumbed the second night.  The Southerner was
+not a flirt--that may have accounted for his elaborate success.  He was
+so far from being a flirt that he fell in love with Ethel Harris and
+proposed to her.
+
+Now, the real working-out kind of proposal is not so common in New York
+as, judging from the population, one might suppose.  Ethel began to
+advise Nelson against spending so much money foolishly.  For a while
+her objections to his "friendship" were overruled; but finally she got
+desperate and candidly told the Canuck he was up against Kentucky.  He
+had to take the hint.
+
+Thus, again, Evan was impressed with the uncertainty of things in the
+metropolis.  He took Ethel's engagement to heart for a day or two,
+until an office-girl accidentally slipped while passing his desk and
+steadied herself on his neck.  She proved to be a married woman,
+however, and Evan turned his attention to spring.
+
+Appearances are against the ex-bankclerk, but he must not be judged too
+rashly on the head of his Manhattan experiences.  It looks as if he had
+forgotten all about Toronto and Hometon; but he had not.  He had never
+written Frankie, it is true, but he had heard about her from his sister
+and had a dim idea that some day he would go back and marry her.  It is
+remarkable how a fellow sticks to his home-town girl!  Through
+jealousies about other girls, like Ethel Harris, through the maze of a
+dance with actresses, he still sees the face that smiled on him across
+the school-room hack in the old town.
+
+In March a very exciting letter came from Henty.
+
+"Dear Evan," it read, "wire me at once.  Tell me if you'll come.  I
+mean to British Columbia.  The Nicola Valley is awaiting our arrival.
+There is a homestead there for each of us.  My father will give me five
+hundred dollars, and I'll share with you, on a loan for life, if you'll
+come.  A fellow only needs to pay ten dollars cash and hold down the
+land six months a year for three years, and make 'reasonable
+improvements.'  I understand they are very lenient about improvements.
+Our five hundred dollars will look after that part of it.  The soil is
+very fertile.  I'm taking a cow with me and a clucking hen.  In the
+winter months we can get a job bookkeeping or lumbering; or if our crop
+of onions turns out well this summer we won't need to work at all in
+winter.  Wire.  Don't let anything penetrate your nut for the next few
+hours but the word 'wire.'  I must know.  Don't let money keep you; if
+you need some, _wire_.  What I have said goes, if you will come.  A. P."
+
+Evan was sitting in the elevated when he read the letter.  It had come
+as he started to work and he had not had time to stop and read it at
+his lodging.  Again at the Bridge he read it.  Around him the crowds
+were surging, rushing to work with that morning vigor that looks as
+though it would last forever.  The merry throng about Evan seemed like
+his friends; the thought that he should leave them made him lonesome.
+What would he do without the morning paper?  Where would he buy
+peppermint chocolates at twenty-five cents a pound?  Even more trivial
+questions than these occupied his mind.
+
+Stuffing the letter in his pocket, he boarded the up-town L, and got
+off at Twenty-third Street.  The Metropolitan tower looked disdainfully
+at him: it was the New York flag-pole, and he was about to desert the
+colors.  At noon-hour he sat in the little restaurant on Twentieth
+Street West.  He had the letter memorized by this time, but he drew a
+bank-book from his pocket to make sure he was familiar with its
+contents.  Yes, the eighty dollars were still there.
+
+After work he was tired.  He was always tired after a day's office
+work.  The hour before supper was always one of yawning, of hurry, dust
+and reflection.  Taking the subway down to the Bridge, he wedged up the
+steps between two foreigners who had been regaling themselves with
+garlic, and looked wistfully at Loft's.  There was a candy-fiend in his
+stomach crying for food.  He was half way to the candy-shop when he
+overcame the evil one with a sweet tooth; he turned back toward the
+Bridge, but seeing a crowd in one of the newspaper offices, stepped in.
+His ear caught the click of a telegraph instrument.  He forgot the
+crowd gazing at new aeroplane models, and found himself again on Park
+Row.  The ten-thousands faded from before his sight, the yapping of
+newsies died away, there was no dust and no yawning: he saw a green
+valley and heard the birds; he saw Henty in chaps astride of a pony;
+and a shanty loomed up.  The blood of Grandpa Nelson bubbled in his
+veins; he was a proud son of Adam, doing business direct with Nature.
+There was no car to catch on the morrow, and no hash-house to
+patronize.  His horses neighed to him, and he heard the sizzle of
+frying ham in a clean frying-pan.
+
+The telegraph instrument continued to click in the young book-keeper's
+ears.  He looked once more on the throng around him: it was the evening
+throng--tired, nervous, hateful.  Men climbed in the cars ahead of
+pale, helpless girls; an old lady clung to the unwilling arm of a
+convict-faced son; and a little newsboy cried brokenheartedly in the
+gutter.  Tiny girls wrestled with bundles of papers; a bald magnate
+cursed his chauffeur for refusing to run down a dog and save time; and
+a policeman chased half a dozen naked urchins who were puddling in City
+Hall Fountain.  When one is tired these things jar on him.  The
+telegraph still ticked in Evan's ear; the valleys still stretched
+before his imagination.  He was aware, now, of a discord in the music
+of his dreaming: it was the noise around him, the shouting, the brutal
+rush.  He turned toward Broadway.
+
+Evan had made up his mind.  He wired Henty that he would go to British
+Columbia.  He asked A. P. to reply by day-message to Twenty-third
+Street.
+
+About noon next day the answer came: "Meet me in Buffalo in two days,
+if possible.  I will be staying at my cousin's, -- Forest Avenue.  If
+necessary I can wait a week for you."
+
+But it was not necessary.  Evan had no difficulty in getting away from
+his position.  The cashier was disappointed, but he did his best to
+hide it; Evan heard him remark to the assistant cashier:
+
+"When we do land a good man he gets offered more elsewhere.  If I
+wasn't afraid of the boss I'd raise Nelson to twenty-five dollars
+rather than lose him."
+
+Wondering, for a moment, if he had not done a foolish thing in
+resigning, Evan scratched his head, but the friction set his
+imagination aglow again--and he bade the office good-bye.
+
+He met Henty in Buffalo the following night.
+
+"What are you going by way of the States for?" he asked.
+
+"So that the Canadian banks won't get you again," said Henty.
+
+After sending his mother a silk scarf and Lou a pair of stockings and a
+box of candy, as a partial atonement for the wrong he was doing them in
+not visiting home, Evan bought a pair of corduroy breeches and heavy
+boots, subscribed for a farm magazine, and set out, with big A. P., for
+the far-away fields.  They say those fields always look green;
+sometimes, perhaps, they _are_ green.
+
+Just as that "Overland Limited" sped along must this story speed.  The
+boys fell asleep in New York State and awakened many miles from its
+border.  And here in this story, as in a Pullman, only more
+obliviously, must the reader sleep--to awaken at a distance.
+
+
+In a certain part of the Nicola Valley stood a cottage known as the
+"Bachelors' Bungalow."  It, was alone except for the companionship of
+stables and out-houses.  It was evidently not built in a land where
+lumber was scarce, for wide, heavy verandahs almost surrounded it.
+
+From any of these verandahs one could get a splendid view of the
+mountains; to the south a green vista of valley stretched away.
+
+A young man sat in the open, not listening to the greybirds or the
+meadowlarks sing of spring, and not revelling in the beauty before and
+around him, but working assiduously at a typewriter.  On either side of
+his little table magazines and newspapers lay in heaps; there were
+Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver and other papers, and
+various Canadian magazines.  Now and then he paused in his writing to
+pick up one of these periodicals and take note of a paragraph he had
+marked.
+
+"I wonder if Alfy ever stops to read any of these articles?" murmured
+Evan, and laughed quietly.  "Judging from the opinion he always had of
+my disability I doubt if he would attribute literary efforts to me."
+
+Now that we know who the young man is and what he is doing at a
+typewriter in the Nicola Valley, it may be well to explain the
+situation.
+
+Three years had passed since Henty and Nelson landed in the green
+fields of their dreams.  They bought seed and other agricultural
+necessities on the way out, old man Henty shipped them two cows, two
+horses, a few hens, a pig, and some farming utensils.  They ordered
+lumber from a Revelstoke company, erected a shack, a temporary shelter
+for the stock, and built a hen-house with a pig-pen annex.
+
+A. P. showed that he was born to be a farmer.  The way he handled the
+plow put Evan to shame; but Evan made up in willingness to work what he
+lacked in physical efficiency.  He learned to milk cows and make
+butter; he went irregularly to the village for the raw food they
+needed, talked the merchant into giving him a line of credit, and
+surveyed the valley all the way home with the pride of Noah after the
+flood.  He developed into so good a cook that A. P. declared there must
+have been a chef in the family away back.
+
+The first crop the boys had was good because it was not very big.  They
+sold their early garden-stuff at a big price to the C.P.R., and in the
+fall got twenty dollars a ton for their potatoes--on the ground.  Every
+drop of milk they could spare found a ready market in the village;
+often they exchanged it for butter.  And those hens of theirs made
+good; they made very good.  A. P. insisted on eating all the eggs, but
+Evan managed to hide away enough each week to buy sugar, tea and bread.
+It must be admitted, however, that bread was more frequently absent
+from than present at the board; crackers and ginger-snaps made edible
+substitutes.
+
+When the first winter set in the bachelors of "Bachelors' Shack"--it
+was not a bungalow yet--were prepared for it.  They had money in the
+bank.
+
+"It's me for a Jew's harp and a line of novels," said Henty; "no
+lumbering for mine this winter.  I'm all calloused from wrestling with
+our valley."
+
+Nevertheless A. P. could not content himself to read longer than a week
+at a time.  He made irregular excursions into the village and juggled
+scantling in a new lumber yard.  Evan wanted to go, too, but Henty
+grunted in disgust--and Nelson agreed to stay home and tend the stock.
+The sow old man Henty had given them raised a family.  One of the pigs
+was killed for meat, and the others were dressed and sold to a butcher.
+
+The winter was mild, and there was enough snow to protect and fertilize
+the ground.  It was a good winter for the young bachelors; the
+wood-chopping they did gave them health abundant, their chores kept
+Henty's superfluous masculinity worked off and taught Nelson the
+practical way of things, and the simple food they ate gave their minds
+an appetite for knowledge.
+
+With all their wood-cutting and chores, though, the boys had more spare
+time than they knew how to dispose of.  Often in the evenings they
+played cards, sang duets from a book of old songs, or read.  To say
+they were always content would not be true; many a time they felt the
+weight of the great Silence about them, and above all they longed for
+the fleeting image of a girl.  If they could only just see one--it
+would be like a drink of water on Sahara!
+
+At long intervals they hired a boy from the village to watch their
+flocks for a couple of days, while they made an excursion to some town.
+There they filled up on candy and picture-shows until they were glad to
+return home.
+
+In many ways the first winter of their squatting in the Nicola Valley
+was a tester on the ex-bankclerks.  They sometimes felt like giving up;
+not because they needed food or drink, but because of the youth in
+them.  Young men are impetuous animals; they want to be forever
+shifting.  Sometimes Evan had to walk in the beautiful winter night
+until he was tired out, so that he could forget his yearnings for city
+life, especially New York life.  He felt the lure of the White Way at a
+distance of three thousand miles.  Others had felt it from the ends of
+the earth, and had succumbed to it.
+
+But Nelson did not succumb.  He knew he must take his mind off the
+East, if he would succeed in the West, and he did so.  He read more and
+more every week.  When Henty was away at the scantlings Evan studied
+and thought.  At last he began to write down his thoughts; he
+discovered that there was great satisfaction in expressing himself to a
+sheet of paper.  He eventually sent to Vancouver for a typewriter,
+bought a book of instruction, and for twenty-one days studied the touch
+method.  He practised six and eight hours a day, with his eyes on the
+chart before him.  At the end of the twenty-one days he was a
+touch-typist, accurate and fairly rapid.  The typewriter off his mind,
+he wrote and wrote.  His heart was fast wrapping itself in vellum.
+Henty looked on in silence for a few weeks, then shook his head and
+said facetiously:
+
+"I'm afraid you don't love me any more, Nelsy."
+
+But spring soon came to A. P.'s relief, with the advent of which Evan
+had to set aside his typewriter and dream without writing down his
+dreams.  Because of faculties newly awakened, however, he found more
+beauty and entertainment in Nature than he had ever seen there before.
+He began to think poems as he worked on the land.  The plots of stories
+came to him, and articles grew upward from the horizon to the sun, or
+in columns like Oriental writings.  At night he would sit up an hour
+longer than his big red-faced friend, and pour out his imaginings to
+the typewriter--the poor typewriter.  The speed he developed was a
+detriment to composition; the faster he went the more hyperbolic and
+awful became his effusions, and so we repeat, the poor typewriter!  It
+had brought about its own terrible punishment.
+
+The summer passed, bringing its crops again, and another batch of pigs.
+A mare and a cow added to the animal creation, too.  Old man Henty sent
+out a reaper and commanded his son to grow hay the following year
+instead of buying it from the Okanagan Valley.  The boys built another
+out-house, bought some calves, and kept adding to their effects.  The
+calves gave Evan copy for some humorous stories, several of which were
+good enough to be rejected by an Eastern magazine.  The young "writer"
+thought the "not available" slip had been written especially for him,
+and its wording flattered him to further submissions.
+
+The second winter was almost a repetition of the first--for Henty; but
+not for his companion.  They made a trip to Vancouver at Christmas and
+sent bundles of presents home.  A. P. loaded up with novels, and, to
+Evan's consternation, bought a guitar.  But he learned to strum it,
+although it took him all winter.
+
+Henty was a marvel in his way.  Nelson put him in many a sketch and
+story.  Not once during the long months had the Banfield ex-junior
+acted the part of a weakling.  Evan reflected that it was easy enough
+for himself to keep within bounds, speaking after the manner of
+Physical Culture, being mentally engaged all the time; but Henty seemed
+to contain himself by force of will.  His virility made a man of him
+instead of being a snare to him.  Evan conceived a hope, founded on the
+respect he had for his companion, that was some day going to be
+realized.
+
+A. P. took increased interest in the writings of his friend.
+
+"Evan," he said, one day, in his sudden way, "I should think that a
+fellow with your habit of writing would tell the story a certain
+ex-bankclerk has to tell about the bank."
+
+"By Jove!" exclaimed Evan.
+
+He went right to work on a long bank story.  He wrote it over and over,
+and submitted it over and over, but it did not meet with success.  One
+editor told him it was too lurid; another said it was immature.  Henty
+swore it was the best thing he had ever seen.  Is it not unfortunate
+that our manuscripts cannot be finally edited by someone who can
+_appreciate_ us?  Gods of Literature! what a bunch of stuff would be
+printed.  Typewriter companies would do away with the instalment plan
+entirely.
+
+Between seeding and haying the third spring, the boys built a bungalow,
+enlarged their animals' quarters, and hired a man.  They were blessed
+with a pretty good crop, and the market was growing.  Other settlers
+had come into the valley, and there was talk of a village springing up
+near-by.  Henty began to wear a smile.
+
+After the fall rush Evan settled down harder than ever to his literary
+efforts.  He wrote articles on the bank.  As if his style had suddenly
+come up to the required standard, editors began to write short letters
+of excuse with returned manuscripts; then to accept.  Why waste words
+on the thrills Evan, yes, and Henty, experienced when they read the
+breezy stuff of "X. Bankclerk" in print!
+
+In his letters home Evan intimated that he would have a surprise for
+them before long, but that was as much as he said.  He filled pages
+describing his and Henty's vines and figtrees, and his father came back
+with: "I told you your grandfather was in you!"  His mother rejoiced in
+his health but longed for him home; Lou called him a "rube;" and
+Frankie--Frankie did not have a chance to say anything because Evan had
+never answered that letter she wrote to New York.
+
+
+Now, as the young man sat on the verandah of his bungalow, not
+listening to the greybirds and meadowlarks around him, he felt happy.
+He and Henty were going to make a trip back to Ontario in the autumn,
+and then he could meet the editors who had congratulated him on his
+"good dope," as one of them had described his articles.  He rattled
+over the keys of his machine, after making the observation about Alfy,
+and was so engrossed in his work that he did not notice the approach of
+Henty.
+
+A. P. had been to Vancouver, and was back sooner than expected.  He
+seemed excited.
+
+"Evan," he cried, jumping on the verandah, "we're made men!  A
+syndicate wants our land!  They're talking of a townsite!"
+
+"The dickens!"
+
+"Yes, sir.  They offered me $60,000, half cash."
+
+"You're drunk, A. P.!"
+
+"No, sir.  You know the head of the syndicate; his name is William
+Watson."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+_HIGH FINANCE AND PROMOTING._
+
+It took Evan some time to recover from the shock association of Bill
+Watson's name with a real-estate syndicate naturally produced.  Then he
+asked Henty bewilderedly:
+
+"Are you going to accept the sixty thousand?"
+
+"Am _I_ going to?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Not unless my partner is willing," replied Henty.  "Isn't one of these
+quarter-sections your own?"
+
+"Yes, but you're manager of both; I don't know whether they're worth
+$60,000 or not.  Would half of it look good to you?"
+
+"You bet," said A. P.  "I'd take a trip around the world, then come
+back and get married; I believe I'd settle down somewhere out here."
+
+"Who would you marry?"
+
+"Oh, anybody.  I feel right now as if I could fall in love with
+anything."
+
+Evan laughed, but soon sobered in thought,
+
+"I think, A. P.," he said, after a pause, "that I can suggest a better
+trip than one around the world.  I've often dreamed about it since my
+bank stuff has been well received.  You know I've been drumming up the
+idea of Bank Union pretty strong.  Why not bestow an everlasting favor
+on Bankerdom by travelling into every nook and corner of Canada and
+organizing the clerks?  You and I could do it.  They all know me by
+reputation, and I would give you credentials."
+
+Henty ran his hands through his hair and looked wild.
+
+"By the jumping Jehoshaphat!" he exclaimed, "what a hit that would
+make!  Why, the boys would make a bronze image of you and a stone one
+of me to pickle our memory forever!  Do you think we could do it?"
+
+"Sure," laughed Evan; "haven't we got all the big newspapers in the
+country on our side?  And aren't the banks in the legislative
+limelight?  They couldn't pull off anything mean on us, because we
+would keep in touch with our editor friends.  If they started firing
+the boys we could appeal to the public."
+
+Henty grew more and more interested, not to say excited.
+
+"You seem to have got the thing all cut and dried!"
+
+"I have," said Evan; "I've been conning it over for months.  At first I
+wondered if I couldn't get some rich man to endow such a movement, and
+make a real philanthropist of himself.  But the trouble with rich men
+is that they want to get richer, and bucking the banks is no way to do
+it--in Canada, anyway."
+
+A. P. let his eyes wander over the valley and up the mountain side.  A
+smile gradually spread over his features.
+
+"Nelsy," he said, "are you sure you haven't got an axe to grind?"
+
+"You bet I have.  Was there ever any sort of reform started by a man
+unless he had known the evil in his own experience?  My grudge against
+the bank is going to be the boys' safeguard, and they will know it.
+They will know I'm out to organize a union because I want to show the
+banks that they are not supreme.  Of course if it were for the
+satisfaction alone, I wouldn't spend a lot of money working it up.  I
+know it will be a great thing for present and future bankclerks--that's
+really why I want it.  But, you see, the boys will know I'm not out for
+graft when I have my own story printed and circulated among them.
+Besides, I won't collect any money; I'll merely carry the union up to a
+point where organization is possible, and then they can entrust the
+finances to anyone they choose.  The thing must appeal to them as a
+business proposition; I think they understand already that a union of
+clerks would be self-supporting.  Some of them are suspicious because
+of past bunco games that have been pulled off under the guise of bank
+unions; but I will leave them no room for suspicion of us fellows.  As
+to the moral success of the thing,--as soon as they realize it is past
+the dangerous stage they will be eager to join.  Every effort so far
+made in the direction of an association of bankclerks has been
+squelched by the head office authorities.  There was one instance in
+Toronto of a bank's firing quite a bunch of clerks who dared to defend
+themselves against the barbarities of the business.  The press didn't
+even get wind of it.  Things would be different now, and the boys would
+soon understand that; for the whole country is discussing those
+articles I have submitted, as well as the innumerable letters and
+articles of endorsation that have come from other clerks and ex-clerks."
+
+"I'm ready to pack up," said Henty suddenly, half-jokingly.  "But we
+haven't got the dough for our land yet.  They want word at once; will I
+go to town and wire them?"
+
+"Yes," replied Evan, mechanically, his whole mind on the bank.
+
+"And how about the girl I'm going to marry?" asked A. P., as he led his
+horse up to the verandah.
+
+"She's in my home town," said Nelson; "her name is Frankie Arling."
+
+"Some name, too," observed Henty, dreamily; "you're not fooling me, are
+you?"
+
+"No," replied Evan, smiling inscrutably.
+
+Together they ate a bite of supper, and then Henty set out on horseback
+for the village.  He returned before Evan was in bed.  Next morning the
+hired man was informed that he would be left alone for a day or two,
+and to watch that the old sow didn't get any more of the hens.
+
+Togged out like the homesteader sports they were, Evan and Henty left
+for Vancouver.  They met the syndicate, who seemed to know every foot
+of land in the Nicola Valley, signed over their 320 acres, received a
+cheque for $30,000 and a note with security for another thirty, and
+refused to participate in a drunk.
+
+"We must get back," said Henty; "I've got the live stock to sell yet."
+
+Bill Watson and Evan excused themselves and went into a side office.
+It was their first opportunity to speak of old times.
+
+"I can't tell you how glad I am you've made good, Evan," said Bill.
+"How did it all happen?"
+
+Evan briefly related his experience since quitting the bank.  Watson
+listened with interest until it leaked out who "X. Bankclerk" was,
+after which his silence changed to: "God love you for that!"
+
+Without heeding the exclamation Evan continued with his story, and
+finally announced his intention of starting a bank union.
+
+"You can do it," said Bill, enthusiastically, "and I'll back you if you
+need more money.  I knew it would come.  It had to come!"  Then, "Won't
+you come down and see Hazel?"
+
+"What, you're married!" cried Evan.
+
+"You bet.  I kept her waiting long enough, didn't I?  But say--won't
+you come down and see her?  I've got something more startling still to
+tell you about; two things!"
+
+Evan wanted to see Hazel and to have a visit with Bill.  He persuaded
+A. P. to stay over a day.
+
+Hazel was a changed girl.  There was the same old peculiar fire in her
+eyes, but she was now healthy and happy looking.
+
+"How good it is to see you, Evan," she said, giving his hand a generous
+squeeze.  "Look who's here!"--pointing to a cradle.
+
+Evan got on his knees to the baby, who acknowledged the attention with
+a coo.
+
+"I'll bet you have started already to spoil him!  By the way, Hazel,
+the little chap reminds me: how did you win Bill all so suddenly?"
+
+Hazel smiled happily:
+
+"Only about a month after you wrote Billy he came down to Hamilton and
+informed me we were going West--together."
+
+Bill turned and looked at Evan.
+
+After supper, while Henty was dividing his attention between Hazel and
+the baby, Bill whispered to Evan:
+
+"The boy is one of the surprises I had for you.  I've got another--come
+in the smoking-room."
+
+Nelson followed, excusing himself with Hazel and Henty.
+
+"Haven't you been wondering, Evan," said Bill, puffing in his wonted
+fashion at a cigarette, "how I got--well, where I am?"
+
+"I admit I have, Bill."
+
+"Well, just listen to my story, and ask questions when I'm through....
+Shortly after receiving your Hamilton letter I made up my mind to get
+some money somewhere and marry Hazel.  She was working her head off and
+worrying herself to death about me; I couldn't stand it any longer.  I
+made up my mind to _get money_.  My chance came.  The cash was short
+one thousand dollars one day--_my_ cash.  I explained that I must have
+paid out two hundred tens instead of fives.  It was Saturday; they had
+transferred me to the second paying-box just a few days before.  I
+figured that here was my chance to make a mistake.  Now, being over
+twenty-one I was my own bondman, and the bank couldn't collect from
+anybody but me--or the guarantee company.  I knew that, of course.
+Well, I pretended to worry myself sick over the loss, and checked my
+vouchers over about a dozen times.  At last I pretended to give up, and
+told them I would look no more for it.
+
+"'All right,' said Castle, 'you'll have to put it up.'"
+
+"I said nothing just then, but before long I told them I would go to
+jail before I'd put it up.  I went to the manager, then to the
+inspector, and hung the bluff around.  At last they decided to kick me
+out of the bank and let the guarantee company make good the loss.  I
+hung around Toronto for a little while, with two five-hundred dollar
+bills tucked under my shirt.  Soon I made a trip to Hamilton, captured
+Hazel, and came to Edmonton, Alberta.  I struck it rich there.  I
+cleaned up ten thousand bucks in a few months.  After that it was easy
+to get fifty thousand.  I'm worth a hundred now."
+
+Bill smiled around his cigarette, and waited for his friend to speak.
+It was no easy matter for Evan to find words, either, although he felt
+that Bill was telling the truth.
+
+"Did you ever pay them back, Bill?" he asked, expectantly.
+
+"Oh, yes," said Watson, drawing a registered-letter slip from his
+pocket.  The receipt was made out to John Honig, for a thousand
+dollars.  "Some assumed name that, eh, Evan?"
+
+"Yes.  How long did you hang on to the coin, Bill?"
+
+"You see the date.  I kept it as long as I thought it was coming to me.
+You know I labored like a lackey for five years on half pay in the
+bank.  They really owed me every cent of the thousand, but I only
+pinched the interest on it for two years.  That wasn't much, eh?  It
+made me rich, though; and so I ought to forgive the bank.  What do you
+think of me, Nelsy, as a one-time Sunday School teacher?"
+
+"I wasn't thinking of the right or wrong of it, Bill, but of your
+nerve.  Just imagine what would have happened if they had caught you."
+
+Bill laughed disdainfully.
+
+"Jail couldn't have been any worse than that office.  My conscience
+troubled me a while--until I found that the thousand was making me
+more.  Then I knew I could pay it back when I liked.  When you come to
+figure it all out, isn't that exactly what the banks do with the
+people's deposits?"
+
+
+As the train wound its way along gorges and through tunnels eastward
+from Vancouver, Henty and Evan were silent.  Evan was thinking of what
+Watson had done, and said.  It was a fact that banks gave three per
+cent. interest on deposits, which they used on speculations in Wall
+Street and elsewhere; those speculations netting them such high
+dividends that great buildings had to be erected to conceal them.  And
+how was the customer treated who wanted to borrow a few hundred dollars
+in an emergency?  Even though he had been a depositor for years,
+getting three per cent., what sort of accommodation was the bank
+willing to give him when he was temporarily up against it?  Evan knew.
+He remembered too well the old excuse handed out to the customer, year
+after year: "We have to cut down our loans."  Why did they _have_ to?
+Why _do_ they have to?  Who makes them, who wants them to do it?  The
+eternal answer is "Head Office."  But who is Head Office?--the bank.
+The bank commands the bank to cut down its loans, just as it commands
+the bank to do many things detrimental to the country's good.  And why
+not?  Don't the people of Canada stand for it?  Don't they give their
+money and sons to the banks, according to the traditions and idolatries
+of their fathers?
+
+Evan's mind dwelt upon High Finance.  He pondered and pondered on the
+thing Watson had done, and, in the light of common business morality,
+could find no fault with it; but in his heart he knew it was wrong.
+The argument he found against it was a trite one, but true: "The wrongs
+of others are no palliation of ours."  If the banks did wrong in using
+depositors' money to earn dividends for the rich, that was not the
+clerk's business--that was the _public's business_.
+
+What then was the clerk's business?  It was the clerk's business to see
+that he received a decent salary.  He did real work, oh very real! and
+he was entitled to a salary upon which he could both live and, at a
+reasonable age, support a wife.  Why didn't he get it?  Because the
+bank could, by intimidation and repression, by promising and bluffing,
+get him for less than a living wage.  But "why" was not so much to the
+point as "how."  _How_ was he going to get it?  How had other workers
+of every description obtained a bread-and-butter wage?  By making
+themselves indispensable to their employers?  Yes.  And how accomplish
+that in banking?  If any man thinks he can make himself indispensable
+to a bank _individually_, he is mistaken.  But men in any trade or
+calling can make themselves necessary to an employer _collectively_ by
+co-operating; and co-operation is the only way.  Evan knew that it was
+the only way for bankclerks to obtain their rights.  The banks would
+not do business with an individual because they didn't have to; it was
+easier to dismiss him.  But their offensively arbitrary methods could
+not be employed where a great number of clerks were concerned.  If the
+bankclerks of Canada were united they could talk as a body, and the
+banks of Canada would be compelled to listen.  It did not occur to Evan
+for a moment that the boys would go on strike: but they would have the
+power to strike, and, if the banks were mad enough to resent business
+negotiations, they would show that they _could_ strike.
+
+Henty wakened out of his reverie and Evan began discussing bank union
+with him.  They had money in their pockets and enthusiasm in their
+souls.  They discussed the workings-out of the scheme, and youthfully
+pictured scenes that were brightest.  Still, had they not dreamed of
+green fields and seen their dreams come true?
+
+"How much are we going to spend on it, Evan?" asked Henty.
+
+"I figure it will cost us two thousand dollars each to get the thing in
+motion.  Then if the organization ever gets rich enough it may want to
+pay us back.  Do you feel like affording so much?"
+
+"Sure--I don't mind a couple of thou'."
+
+Nelson laughed; he was happy.  The spirit of the reformer had somehow
+got into his system and he thought only of the work before him.  He
+tried to estimate the happiness it would bring to the worn-out clerk,
+the booze-fighting clerk, the forced-to-be-untrue lover clerk, the poor
+parents who spent their savings in fitting out juniors for the "glory
+of the bank," and the girls waiting in home towns....  His imagination
+came to a halt, for a space, and he very unimaginatively sighed over
+by-gone illusions.  Then he forgot the bitterness of disillusionment in
+a picture that framed itself on the window of the observation-car,
+against a dark background of passing rock and pines.  He saw himself
+walking beside Frankie on one of the streets of Hometon.  Her dear eyes
+were downcast, but her hand was willingly in his, and they were
+speaking of the days when he should come back a manager!  A longing
+made itself felt in his heart, a longing to go back and redeem his
+pledge; but he hesitated.  He knew she was not married to Perry--Porter
+was no longer in Hometon--but Evan felt unworthy of her after a silence
+of over three years.  He had often thought of writing her and asking
+forgiveness, but had not been in a position to marry her--until the
+syndicate came along.  He had told himself all along that it was
+poverty that kept him from renewing his love; but now that poverty no
+longer stared him in the face, now that he could give her a home, he
+hesitated.  Why?--Because he was afraid!  He knew he loved her and he
+feared to run the risk of a rebuff by mail.  Such is the cowardice of a
+guilty lover's heart.  He realized that he had hurt her very deeply;
+hints from Lou had convinced him of that; and he felt that he would
+have to go for her in person and in earnest to fully demonstrate his
+all too mysterious affection.  He had a strong impulse to stay on the
+train, with fifteen thousand dollars in his wallet, and make a run for
+Hometon; but he knew that would be rash.  He wanted to go to Frankie
+with more than money; he wanted to go in all contrition and to carry
+news of his triumphs over the bank that had disgraced him.
+
+"Where will we start in?" asked Henty, rousing.
+
+For a moment Evan did not comprehend the question, then he smiled,
+remembering how readily Henty usually thought things out.  A. P. must
+have been pondering very deeply to take so long a time in evolving that
+simple question.  It was to the point, however; they might as well work
+from west to east, seeing that they were so near the Pacific and so far
+from the Atlantic.  That consideration had caused Evan to hesitate when
+his impetuosity suggested Frankie at a single jump.
+
+"Vancouver, I guess, A. P."
+
+"That means," said Henty, grinning, "that I'll be a long time before I
+meet that Hometon girl of yours--of mine."
+
+"Not so very long."
+
+"What did you say her name was, again?"
+
+"Arling--Frankie Arling.  I'm sure you'll fall in love with her."
+
+A. P. stretched, yawned and replied:
+
+"I'm sure I will, too."
+
+They sold out their stock and effects at a good profit--Henty always
+looked out for the profit.  When the people of the village, fifteen
+miles away, heard that the boys of Bachelors' Bungalow were leaving
+they gave a dance, at which there were present lumberjacks as chief
+masters of ceremony and hotel-maids as belles.  One of the village
+storekeepers was there, too, with bitter complaints against Fate.
+
+"Dang you," he said, "how do you think a man's goin' to make a livin'
+out of these Chinks?  Dang me if it ain't a shame as you're leavin'."
+
+"Cheer up, Uncle Dud," said Henty, "I'll be coming back with a wife
+sometime, and then your sales will double."
+
+In less than a month after they had closed the deal with the syndicate
+the boys took leave of their bungalow.  They still owned it and the
+little plot of ground on which it stood, but they were loath to leave
+just the same.  A meadowlark sang them a farewell, and the sweetness of
+his song affected Henty's eyes.  Nelson saw it and liked his friend
+better than ever.
+
+"I don't blame them for wanting to make a townsite of this valley,"
+said A. P., as they drove to the station.  "They won't be stinging
+anybody no matter what they charge for the lots."
+
+Before doing battle in Vancouver the two "farmers" held a day's
+consultation.  They warmed up on a matinee, digested a Chinese dinner
+of chop suey and foyung, rice-cakes and various uncivilized desserts,
+went to bed late, and next morning had a plunge in the ocean.  By that
+time they had decided Vancouver was a bad place to begin operations in,
+and they took boat for Victoria.  There they really went to work.
+
+Selecting one of the largest offices, Evan sauntered in and took a view
+of the staff.  Henty was waiting around the corner.  Strange to say,
+two or three of the bankboys were taking a rest by one of the desks.
+Evan approached them and asked a general question about the town, as a
+stranger might.  He liked the way one of the fellows looked at and
+talked to him, and made bold to reveal his identity.  The clerk held
+out his hand:
+
+"Put it there!" he said; "will you come up to our rooms to-night?
+We'll have a bunch there to see you that'll make your hair stand on
+end."
+
+The ball was about to roll.  Evan gave his promise and went out to
+rejoin Henty.
+
+"A. P.," he said, "we've got them going.  I've discovered the best way
+to proceed.  Just spot some fellow who looks good to you and then lead
+up to the subject of X. Bankclerk.  If he is not interested pass him up
+and keep on looking till you find someone who is; then leave the
+raising of a crowd to him.  In cities like this we can afford to spend
+two or three days."
+
+Henty was excited.  He flushed as only he could flush, and closed his
+fists with nervous satisfaction.
+
+The Victoria bankclerk got together a crowd, as he had promised; there
+were old and young fellows, tall and short fellows, but all good
+fellows.  They forced Nelson into a speech, which they cheered and
+applauded.  They insisted on ordering drinks, but Evan told them he
+would be disappointed if they started off a union that way.  They were
+all anxious to have their names enrolled as first members of "_The
+Associated Bankclerks of Canada_."  One of the boys went down to a
+bookstore and returned with a record book in which applications for
+membership were to be enrolled.
+
+Nelson took the boys into his confidence, and their sympathy was
+aroused.  He suggested that each man present do his best by letter or
+otherwise to enlist other clerks in the movement.  Not only names but
+signatures were to be collected and pasted in the record book.  Nothing
+was to be done that would put an instrument of destruction in the hands
+of head office.  All letters were to be addressed to Evan Nelson,
+Hometon, Ontario.  He wrote the post-office there to hold his mail for
+further orders.
+
+The "organizers"--they grinned as they applied the term to each
+other--spent two nights among the Victoria clerks, who agreed to take
+charge of Vancouver Island, then departed for Vancouver.  There it took
+them three days and nights to work things up.  They got a heap of
+circulars printed, with the following titles: "What the Bank Did to
+Me;" "Why Are You a Bankclerk?"; "Bank Union"; "Why Does Head Office
+Resent Co-operation of Clerks?"; and others, all by "X. Bankclerk."
+Printed matter was left in the hands of every man who wrote his name in
+the record book.  Head office might get hold of a circular, but what
+could they do about it?
+
+After finishing Vancouver, Nelson and Henty turned their attention to
+towns and villages.  They carried with them, after less than a
+fortnight's work, about fifty letters of introduction to clerks all
+over the Dominion; that bundle was going to increase twenty-fold before
+they reached Halifax.
+
+Small towns were easy; the boys sometimes did two and three a day.  A.
+P. proved to be a whirlwind talker when he got warmed up to it.  He
+parted from Evan at Sicamous Junction, and went down the Okanagan
+Valley.  Evan went on to Revelstoke and worked the Arrow Lakes.  In two
+weeks they met at Penticton, as glad to see each other as if they had
+been separated for years.  They had many funny incidents to relate and
+plenty of success to discuss.  The ball was rolling even faster than
+they had expected.
+
+It was Sunday.  They walked through the pretty streets of Penticton,
+enjoying the splendor of an Okanagan day.  By and by they passed a
+graveyard.  A man and woman were standing beside one of the graves;
+they looked up at the boys, but seemed not to recognize either of them.
+Evan turned pale, momentarily, then walked up to the man and woman.
+She wept when he told her who he was, and she related to him the story
+of a girl who had loved too young; who had faded and contracted
+consumption, back in Huron County, Ontario.  They had brought her out
+to the mountain valleys, hoping the air would cure her, but she must
+have been too far gone.
+
+In the evening, while Henty was writing letters, Evan went out for a
+walk.  He wandered along a back street until he came again to the
+cemetery.  A greybird sang its sweet song to him--but not only to him.
+Evan was thrilled with the sad beauty of that song, and of the Song of
+Life.  Until the sun's rays had disappeared and the little greybird's
+singing was done, he sat, alone, beside Lily's grave.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+_THE ASSOCIATED BANKCLERKS OF CANADA._
+
+It was Labor Day morning.  Massey Hall had been rented for the
+afternoon and evening to accommodate a mass meeting of bankclerks.  The
+newspapers of Toronto, Montreal, Hamilton, London and Guelph, as well
+as the other big towns within a radius of four hundred miles from
+Toronto, had printed the news.
+
+Notices had come in from over four hundred out-of-town clerks,
+promising attendance.  Evan and A. P. were busy.  Girl-friends of
+Toronto clerks had formed themselves into a club for the making of
+badges and pennants with which the boys and the assembly room,
+respectively, were to be decorated.
+
+When the "organizers" arrived at Massey Hall already a score of young
+ladies were nursing bundles of bunting, anxious to have someone hold
+the ladders for them.
+
+Before long city clerks began dropping in, bringing telegrams and
+letters bearing encouraging announcements.  Evan called for volunteers
+to act on a reception committee, to meet all trains and to introduce
+the fellows.  Everybody responded, and ten were selected.
+
+A thousand seats were reserved for bankboys, five hundred for their
+friends, and the rest were free to the public.  The newspapers had
+discovered two orchestras willing to serve gratis; both of them were
+accepted, and came in the forenoon for rehearsal under one leader.
+
+During decorations Henty seemed to think that the girls required
+watching.
+
+"I should think, A. P.," said Nelson, aside, "that when you survived
+Nova Scotia you ought to stand a few Toronto beauties."
+
+"Believe me," replied Henty, "these are hard to beat.  By the way, we
+ought to have a reception committee for girls.  A good many of the
+fellows will bring their friends along."
+
+"A good idea," laughed Evan; "you look after it, will you?"
+
+"You bet.  I wouldn't mind being that committee myself."
+
+A. P. did look after it, and not vicariously.
+
+Time sped.  Every train brought in a bunch of town clerks.  They came
+from far and near; from every city and almost every hamlet in Ontario.
+
+Nelson and Henty themselves went down to the Montreal train.  Two
+hundred and fifty boys came in on it.  They hailed from Quebec,
+Montreal, Kingston, Peterborough, and points along the line.  When they
+recognized X. Bankclerk, whose common-looking face had been reproduced
+in most of the big Canadian dailies, they cheered and shouted until
+holiday travellers stood aghast.
+
+The Windsor train came in about eleven o'clock, shortly after the
+Montreal, bringing a delegation larger than the Eastern.  Union Station
+was crammed with bankclerks, and a band was waiting for them on Front
+Street.  After a fair display of noise and confusion the boys formed in
+quadruple line and marched up town.  Two men in the van carried a
+gigantic streamer bearing the inscription: "The A.B.C.'s."
+
+As they marched up Yonge Street Evan saw a figure with a pointed beard
+and a hand-bag disappear around the corner of Temperance Street, as
+though afraid to face the music.  It is hardly probable the Big Eye was
+going to the Moon Theatre to buy tickets for an afternoon performance.
+Nelson would not have been at all surprised at that, but he thought it
+more likely that Castle would forego the pleasure of a burlesque
+performance, on that day of his defeat, and crawl into the gallery of
+Massey Hall.
+
+By noon seven hundred bankclerks were assembled.  Henty drew Evan's
+attention to the fact that it was chiefly the country chaps who brought
+their lady-friends; the city fellows probably had had a strenuous time
+of it paying their own fares.  Nevertheless, there was present a good
+representation of the fair sex.
+
+A. P. and Evan had lunch with Mr. and Mrs. Nelson and Lou, from
+Hometon.  It was a happy reunion.
+
+Mrs. Nelson cried with joy; Lou blushed at the look of admiration her
+brother gave her; and George Nelson's eyes twinkled.
+
+"And this is Mr. Henty!" cried Mrs. Nelson, after her first little cry.
+
+"Yes," said Evan, looking at Lou, "this is the other rube."
+
+Lou's face burned.
+
+"I didn't include Mr. Henty," she explained, "when I used to call you a
+rube, brother.  In fact, you both look like real sports now."
+
+"Oh, we're sports all right," said A. P., laughing with peculiar
+animation.
+
+Was there nothing lacking at that lunch-party?  Why then did Evan, for
+brief moments, seem absent-minded?  Probably it was the bank union that
+engaged his thoughts.  His sister had so many questions to ask him he
+could not get a chance to formulate a sufficiently sly question about
+Hometon, and the people there.  When he observed that he was going up,
+with Henty, to rest a while, his mother said:
+
+"You'll see everything the way you left it; nothing new to tell you,
+son.  Except--oh, well!--How many thousand miles have you travelled?"
+
+"We estimate them in millions," said Henty, soberly.
+
+Noon-hour passed away very rapidly, and the boys escorted the Nelsons
+over to the Hall.  Henty was informed that somebody waited to see him.
+It was the old gentleman.
+
+He was dressed in typically farmer style, and wore a merry smile.
+After a brief greeting with his son he turned for an introduction to
+Lou, and was soon chuckling at everything she said.
+
+One of the reception committee came hurrying up to Evan and whispered
+that the assembly was waiting.
+
+"We've got a box for your folk," said the bankclerk.
+
+The other boxes were filled with ladies, none of whom were more
+attractive than Lou Nelson.  Old man Henty pushed her chair out where a
+thousand bankmen might admire her, and it took her several minutes to
+master the color in her cheeks.
+
+The two "organizers" came on the platform together, and the audience
+applauded generously.  Evan sat down while Henty, his face aflame,
+announced in quavering voice:
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen, and especially boys of Bankerdom, instead of
+introducing you to Mr. Nelson and myself we will ask you all to stand
+and sing the Canadian National Anthem."
+
+The orchestra leader faced the audience, with his baton poised, and one
+of the players led in the singing.  The sound of the pipe organ itself
+was drowned in the strains of "O Canada" that swelled from so many
+young Canadian throats.
+
+Thoroughly thrilled, when the singing was done Evan arose to speak.
+There was a demonstration of a few minutes, then the speaker's voice
+rang out vibrantly:
+
+"Dear friends, I thank you for such a welcome.  I am going to make a
+short speech, but not because I want to: the occasion demands it.
+There are many people here, who want to know what this is all about.  I
+shall tell them and then we will get down to business.
+
+"Perhaps if I had not been fired from one of the banks in this city,
+about four years ago, I should not be here now trying to organize a
+bank union.  But I don't want any of you to think it is revenge I am
+after; I am really here to make it impossible for any clerk to be
+discharged and disgraced as I was, without a trial.  You all know my
+story, how I was denied the right to plead my own cause, and all the
+rest of it.  It is hard for me to forgive--I never can forgive them;
+but let us forget them.  Those days of tyranny are over--dating from
+to-day."
+
+Nelson was smothered in cheers and clapping of hands.
+
+"The great necessity for clerk union," he resumed, "is based on a
+condition of affairs, still prevalent in the business, which made it
+easy for the bank to fire and blackball myself.  I represented the
+clerk who had no protection; the insignificant individual.  He
+is--rather I should say, dating from to-day--he has been clay in the
+potter's hands; but the potter has got to go out of business, and we're
+here now to see that he does."  (Here, the bankclerks expressed their
+endorsement of the idea in clapping and laughter.)  "Heretofore, my
+friends, we have been the mere tools of a combination of rich
+institutions; they have hired and fired us how and when they pleased.
+We are sick of it; it's bad business."
+
+"You bet it is," cried someone in the crowd; and the galleries enjoyed
+the show.
+
+"I see a great many girls here to-day," continued the speaker, "and
+they look like the friends of bankclerks.  Now what is going to become
+of them unless we can make enough money to support them?  An engagement
+never made any girl happy, after it was more than two or three years of
+age.  How many of us have been engaged for five and ten years, and
+can't even yet afford to make good our promise?  I'm glad you take it
+as a joke, instead of growing angry with me; but, my bank friends, it
+is not a joke, particularly to the girl who is waiting for you and me."
+
+The seriousness of Nelson's tone had its effect on the audience, and
+the silence that followed his last sentence was tense.
+
+"There are many other crows," he went on, "to pick with head office,
+the majority of which will have to be plucked in committee meetings of
+the A.B.C.'s."  (Applause.)  "We are here to get the organization of
+that association under way, rather than to entertain our friends.  So
+with your permission I will conclude my introduction and begin business
+by asking you to form a _pro tem._ organization.  Who will you have for
+temporary chairman?"
+
+Before Evan had sat down several bankmen were on their feet nominating
+him for chairman.  Henty tried to elicit some other nomination but
+failed: they shouted and whistled for Nelson.  He thanked them and took
+the chair.  A. P. was chosen secretary, a committee to draft
+resolutions and by-laws was selected, and a full temporary organization
+effected.
+
+To relieve the monotony of business the orchestra was asked for an
+overture, and while it was playing Evan was called behind the scenes.
+A gentleman, whom he took for a bank official, was waiting to speak to
+him.
+
+"My name is Jacob Doro," said the gentleman; "I am a friend of your
+movement.  Let me congratulate you on this splendid success.  I want to
+make a suggestion, Mr. Nelson, and hope you will not misunderstand me.
+Will you accept an endowment for the establishment of a sort of club
+here in Toronto, where bankclerks can congregate, have a library, a
+gymnasium, and recreation of every kind?  I am president of a loan
+company, and if you will not accept a donation, you will at least
+accept a loan on a long note."
+
+Evan was, of course, surprised.
+
+"That is a good scheme of yours, Mr. Doro," he said, "but why should
+you want to throw away money on us bank-fellows?"
+
+"It won't be thrown away, Mr. Nelson," replied the stranger; "I was not
+always rich, but now I am, and it would give me great pleasure to endow
+this bankclerks' association.  In the days when I was struggling I had
+a son enter the banking business, and they killed him with work.  Now
+perhaps you understand?"
+
+No one could have doubted the sincerity of a man who spoke with the
+feeling Doro evinced.  Evan held out his hand.
+
+"We will be needing friends," he said; "may I use your name, Mr. Doro?"
+
+Mr. Doro thought a moment before replying.
+
+"I'm not afraid of the banks," he said, finally; "and, besides, by
+telling my name and why I give the money, you will attract other
+contributions.  I know you will.  Tell the boys I donate $25,000, and
+that I know others who have several thousands to spare."
+
+Feeling a bit unsteady, Evan offered Doro a seat on one of the wings of
+the stage, then went back to the platform.  When the overture was
+finished he stood before the assembly again.
+
+"I have great news for you," he said, and related the newly-found
+philanthropist's offer.  There was perfect order while he spoke, but it
+was evident the clerks were restraining themselves.
+
+"Let us see Mr. Doro," one fellow shouted.  Everyone clapped the
+suggestion.
+
+"He will appear at our meeting to-night," said Evan, answering for
+Doro, "when we convene to elect permanent officers."
+
+They were satisfied with that.  Mr. Doro's suggestion was talked to
+informally by different men from Montreal, London and other cities, all
+of whom were in favor of some such institution as the one proposed.
+The general opinion was that it would be a fine thing for the boys;
+would serve as a rendezvous for transient clerks, make a good club for
+city men, and promulgate the spirit of sociability.  Toronto was
+thought to be the most convenient city in the Dominion to have as
+headquarters for the A.B.C.'s: there Hague conferences with head office
+would take place.
+
+At a signal from the chairman the orchestra began to play a song
+entitled "Bankerdom."  It was sung by a quartette of clerks, and
+afterwards by the Assembly, who were provided with printed copies.  The
+refrain went:
+
+  "O Bankerdom, dear Bankerdom,
+  We sing to thee a freedom-song;
+  The years have gone that knew us dumb,--
+  The years we found so hard and long;
+  And here to-day is taken from
+  Our aching wrists the silver thong
+  That bound us to a monied wrong,
+  Our Bankerdom, free Bankerdom!"
+
+
+About five o'clock the afternoon session was adjourned.
+
+A. P.'s father, who was quite a plunger when he came to town, persuaded
+the Nelsons to dine with him at a first-class hotel.  Evan could not go
+along; he had accepted an invitation to dine at Mrs. Greig's.
+
+Sam Robb was ill--that accounted for his absence from the mass meeting
+in the afternoon.  Evan had been to see him a few days before, but Robb
+was too sick to talk.  Now he was downstairs in carpet slippers, and
+looked pretty well.
+
+"How did it come off?" was his salutation.
+
+Evan described the whole affair, to the ex-manager's extreme
+satisfaction.  Before they had been conversing long he asked frankly,
+
+"Are you still slaving away?"
+
+"Yes," sighed Robb; "but the union will help us boys."
+
+"Why do you smile, Mrs. Greig?" asked Nelson, himself smiling.  She
+looked at Robb before answering.
+
+"To hear an old married man call himself a boy."
+
+"Married!"
+
+The ex-manager laughed and blushed.
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "our landlady's name is Mrs. Robb; I hadn't the
+nerve to tell you before."
+
+Although the same landlady objected to "Sammy's going out in the night
+air," Sam accompanied Evan to Massey Hall after dinner.  As they walked
+down University Avenue Evan could scarcely realize that his position
+had altered so greatly in four years.  He thought of the day after he
+had been dismissed and how dejectedly he had sat, with a swelled head,
+on one of those avenue benches.
+
+"Do you know," said his old friend, replying to a reminiscent
+observation of Evan's, "that spree of yours cured me; that and Ede."
+
+At Massey Hall, Robb was introduced to Mr. Henty's party, and took a
+seat in their box.
+
+The hall was filled again.  At the front of the balcony a bevy of
+suffragists were seated, ready to approve of a movement that appealed
+to their adventurous spirits.  Evan noticed their colors and gave them
+a public welcome.  He said he was proud of their support, and hoped
+they would win in their fight against Man as satisfactorily as the
+bankclerks were winning against Money.
+
+After a few general remarks the chairman exhibited a record book in
+which he said there were written and pasted about one thousand two
+hundred names of applicants for membership in the association.  Not
+more than two hundred of those present, of whom there were one
+thousand, were enrolled; so that, to start with, the A.B.C.'s would
+have a membership of two thousand.  He held up an armful of mail which
+had been forwarded from Hometon, to illustrate the enthusiasm with
+which bankclerks everywhere were responding to the call.
+
+"Now let us proceed with permanent organization," he said, using a bank
+ruler for a gavel; "we must first have a resolution to form an
+association; after that decide on a name; then elect officers and
+appoint committees."
+
+A man arose in the audience.  "Mr. Chairman," he said, "might I speak a
+word?"
+
+Evan recognized the speaker.  "Come on up to the platform," he invited;
+"I was forgetting about you, Mr. Doro."
+
+The audience shouted "Platform!" and Doro reluctantly obeyed.
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "and you boys in the banking business,
+I hope you will understand that I am not looking for notoriety here
+to-night.  I merely want to boost a good thing along.  Now I don't want
+to force a donation on this society, but if you will accept it you are
+welcome to it; if you cannot see your way clear to accept it, I beg of
+you to borrow from my trust company as freely as you wish.  I will
+accept the signatures of your executive without security."
+
+There was a terrific demonstration.  After it had quieted, Evan
+whispered to Mr. Doro that they were not yet organized, but as soon as
+they were they would entertain his offer.  In the meantime he was given
+a seat on the platform.
+
+Motions began to circulate.  In a few minutes it had been decided to
+organize a union; a name was chosen; a brief constitution was adopted;
+and the election of officers began.
+
+The name of president came up first.  The bankclerks would have nobody
+but Nelson.  He thanked them briefly, assuring them he would look after
+their interests with all his might.  It was thought advisable not to
+have a vice-president.  For secretary-treasurer A. P. Henty was
+nominated.  In a short speech he declined, and finished by suggesting
+Mr. Sam Robb, whom he said would know how to handle the banks because
+he had been a manager.
+
+"Does anybody know him?" called someone, during a silence.
+
+"Yes," replied the president, coming to the front of the stage.  "If
+any man is competent of handling the work, and worthy of the honor, I
+know Mr. Robb to be.  He is one of the best friends I have, and I know
+him to be both clever and honest.  Added to his ability and integrity,
+he has experience; and the ways of big business are plain to him.  My
+friends, we need just such a man as Mr. Robb for secretary-treasurer."
+
+Their gratitude to Evan for his long efforts in making a bank union
+possible would not permit the assembly to reject the man whom the
+president so strongly recommended for the position of secretary.  They
+elected Robb to the office, on a good salary.
+
+Why go into further details of the organization?  It was in good hands,
+and behind it were the brains of two thousand young Canadian
+businessmen.  Why should it not work out?  And with the initiation fee
+and monthly dues, why should it not pay as it grew?
+
+A committee on finance was chosen, to thoroughly canvass any endowments
+offered.  Mr. Doro's offer was refused, but the association made him
+honorary-president and adopted a resolution to borrow money from him
+for the erection of a Bankclerks' Retreat in Toronto.  The financial
+committee saw to it that Nelson and Henty were refunded their expenses
+from Victoria to Halifax.
+
+The hour was late before the evening session adjourned.  A. P.
+delivered a farewell address, in which he declared he was "not cut out
+for office work," and Sam Robb convinced the assembly that he was the
+man for the office they had conferred upon him.
+
+Evan cut his closing sentences short.  As the orchestra played "God
+Save the King" he looked down into the audience and saw someone pushing
+toward the platform.  It was the Bonehead.
+
+"Hey," said Perry, beckoning to Evan, "I want to speak to you."  He
+dragged his yielding victim to a corner.  "This union'll just about
+bring my salary up to the marriage mark.  Fine, ain't it?  I suppose
+you know that Frank and I are----"
+
+"No, I didn't know," replied Evan, coldly.  Then, absently, "Did you
+bring her down with you?"
+
+"Sure.  I've been working in Orangeville; she came down on the late
+afternoon train and I met her on the way.  Why don't you congratulate
+me?"
+
+Nelson acted as though he had not heard.  "Where is she?" he asked.
+
+"Oh, she beat it with a friend just before the thing was dismissed.
+She's staying with her cousin on Jarvis Street.  We're going back
+together on the morning train."
+
+Never in his life had Perry been so objectionable to Nelson as he was
+during those few minutes.  The egotism of him to aspire to Frankie's
+love!  And yet there came to Evan the stinging realization that he,
+himself, had failed to cherish that love.  It was not the Bonehead's
+fault that he was engaged to her--who could blame him?  That was a
+matter for Frankie to decide, and apparently she had decided.
+
+Evan had no heart for further handshakes.  He sought out Robb and
+taking him by the arm left Massey Hall by the stage entrance.  Rain had
+fallen in torrents and the gutters were full of water, but the sky had
+cleared, and the air was fresh and cool.
+
+"Let's walk home," said Robb, "I'm all worked up; this thing has taken
+away my breath--I need the air."
+
+Evan did not smile; he walked along in silence.
+
+"What's the matter, old man?" asked his friend when they had reached
+University Avenue; "has something disappointed you?"
+
+"No," said Evan, ashamed of his moodiness, "I was just thinking of one
+night similar to this when I was on the cash-book.  Doesn't it seem a
+long time ago, Sam?"
+
+Robb took a deep breath at the word "Sam."
+
+"Old friend," he said, vibrantly, "you can't understand what you've
+done for me to-night.  I was almost at the breaking-point."
+
+Evan's eyes were turned up a side street, an unpaved street where the
+mud was deep and slimy.
+
+"For heaven's sake!" he whispered, "look who goes there!  When I
+whistle," he continued excitedly, "you fall back and watch for cops.
+I'm going to spoil that blue coat and those flannel pants."
+
+"I recognize him," said Robb; "go easy; remember you've been a farmer."
+
+It was past midnight.  The avenue was deserted.  Large chestnuts
+clothed the side street, down which the person designated walked, in
+darkness.
+
+Evan fairly panted as he trailed his quarry.  Within a few rods of It
+he began to run noiselessly upon the grass.  Then he pounced upon it,
+like a jaguar upon a fawn.  Sam was a short distance behind.
+
+Down in the mud went the blue coat and flannel pants, and there echoed
+a cry much like that of a frightened girl.  Smothering that cry with a
+handful of mud, Evan proceeded to plaster every part of his victim,
+except the ears, into one of which he facetiously whispered:
+
+"Alfy dear, this is Evan."
+
+All but howling, Castle scrambled out of the gutter and ran for his
+life.
+
+Sam tried several times to speak, as they walked up to his home, but
+his eye fell on Evan's muddy raincoat and he failed.  Through the night
+Mrs. Robb was startled by certain silent convulsions.
+
+"Sammy," she whispered, "are you ill?"
+
+"Yes, Ede," he said jerkily, "a pain in the side."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+_SHE WAITS FOR US._
+
+Early next morning Evan was at Henty's hotel.
+
+"A. P.," he said, "all aboard for Hometon."
+
+The old man looked up.
+
+"Take him with you if you like, Mr. Nelson," he said; "but mind you
+bring him back, and come along yourself.  I've got a cook down home I
+want you to taste."
+
+Evan accepted the invitation and expressed hope that the cook was not
+from Western Canada.  A. P. jumped into his clothes.
+
+"I'm ready," he said, soon; "have I time for breakfast?"
+
+"No; get a banana on the way down town.  Our folks will meet us at
+Union Station."
+
+They missed the Teeswater train, in spite of their hurrying, or,
+perhaps, on account of their hurrying; and had to wait for the Owen
+Sound.
+
+"You couldn't guess who went out on the first train, Evan," whispered
+Lou, looking wise.
+
+"Frankie and Porter, I imagine," replied Evan, casually.
+
+"How did you know?"
+
+"Met Perry last night," answered the brother, briefly.  "What are you
+looking so queer about, Sis?"
+
+"Oh, nothing," said Lou, disappointedly; "only I thought you would be
+more interested than you are."
+
+He made no reply, again to his sister's astonishment, but turned to
+Henty.
+
+"A. P.," he said, "we'll meet the girl you're going to marry, when we
+get to Orangeville.  We'll have to change from this train to hers."
+
+A. P. blushed ridiculously, and so did Lou.  Evan pretended not to
+notice, and turned his attention to the luggage.
+
+On the way to Orangeville father and son found each other interesting.
+There was still a sparkle in George Nelson's eye.  Back in a double
+seat Henty was bravely endeavoring to take care of two ladies, mother
+and daughter.
+
+At Orangeville, as Perry was saying his farewells to Frankie, Lou
+caught her eye and beckoned to her.  Not having to pass the seat where
+Evan and his father were, Frankie obeyed the summons.  She was
+introduced to Henty, and deliberately sat beside him.  "The porter"
+looked sourly around and disappeared.  Evan caught a girl's eye in a
+mirror and left his seat.  Not having seen Frankie for three years and
+a half he was somewhat prepared for a change, but not for the change
+that had taken place.  Her cheeks were no longer round and girlish, her
+voice had changed, her eyes were older and more womanly-comprehending.
+
+"Frankie," he said, taking the little hand she offered, "it seems
+mighty good to get a look at you after--all that has happened."
+
+He fully expected that she would show embarrassment--he was inwardly
+excited himself--but she answered him calmly, while Lou looked on in
+wonder:
+
+"I've been looking at you for hours, Evan--on the platform; you are
+quite famous _now_, you know.  Everyone waits to get a peep at you."
+
+There was a potent rebuke in her words.  Evan felt it keenly.  He made
+an excuse to get back to his father.
+
+Hometon was out with the town band to meet the Nelson party.  Some of
+the bankclerks had driven to the depot in hacks to meet him they called
+their "New G. M."
+
+The excitement did not appeal to Evan, but he readily forgave dear old
+Hometon this one excess.  There was a concert arranged in the town-hall
+for the evening, which, of course, had to have a chairman.
+
+Just before the concert began old Grandpa Newman nudged John, the
+grocer, sitting beside him, and whispered huskily:
+
+"It do beat all, John, the way people carry on nowadays.  Now, in my
+day--"
+
+Luckily for the grocer, the band began to badly play a march.  The
+chairman grinned in his seat--in fancy he was transported to Albany
+Avenue, Brooklyn, and listened again to the saloon bands of that
+benighted street.
+
+The day after the village dissipation Evan loitered around home playing
+catch with Henty and Lou.  He found they liked to have the ball tossed
+midway between them, and did his best to be accommodating.
+
+"Well, A. P.," he said, when Lou had given up the game to help get
+lunch, "what do you think of Miss Arling?"
+
+Henty blushed from his adam's-apple to the tips of his ears, one grand
+and final blush.
+
+"Evan," he said, "I'm in love."
+
+"I thought you'd fall in love with her, A. P.," was the reply.
+"Frankie is the finest girl in town."
+
+"For you, maybe," said A. P., "but not for me.  Nelsy," he continued in
+confusion, "we have known each other a long while.  What would you
+think of me if I told you I loved your sister?"
+
+A smile, happy yet troubled, was the answer Henty got.
+
+
+In the afternoon Evan sat reading beneath the old maple trees that had
+shaded his school-books from the sun in the beloved school-days gone
+by.  Lou came out and stood beside him a moment, and when he looked up
+she bent over him, with the lovelight in her eyes.
+
+"Brother," she said, "I knew you would bring him to me, but I never
+dreamed he would be so grand!"
+
+The brother laughed and teased her.  When she had gone he sat musing on
+the wonders of a girl's heart.  There came to him, as there had often
+come, the sure knowledge that he possessed such a treasure; but this
+time came also the fear that that treasure might unwillingly be given
+to another, for reasons that puzzle men.
+
+"What foolish creatures we are," ran his thoughts.  "I know that
+Frankie is waiting for me to come.  I have known it for years, and she
+made me see it again yesterday on the train.  I don't know why I can't
+get up the courage to face the girl I love.  I must.  I must go now and
+make good my promise.  She is waiting for me in spite of all!"
+
+More serious, perhaps, than he had ever been, he walked down the back
+street along which a schoolboy and schoolgirl had so often strolled
+together.  When he came to the Arling residence he ascended the steps
+with a palpitating heart.  The front door was open.  He rapped timidly
+and waited, but there was no response.  He peeked in, believing that
+someone must be there.
+
+Yes, Someone was there.  She lay on the couch asleep, tear stains on
+her cheeks.  He moved toward her and knelt beside the couch.  Her eyes
+opened in wonder.
+
+"I've come for you," he said, quietly.
+
+She studied him as if he puzzled her.  There was the mystified
+expression of a baby's eyes in hers.  For a while they gazed at each
+other; then came the tears that must stain her face forever with marks
+of happiness, and she murmured:
+
+"I can't believe my dream has come true!"
+
+No questions were asked.  What mattered the past, now?  Porter Perry
+and Hamilton episodes were no longer of any consequence.  The only
+significant thing was love; love that had endured and was therefore
+true.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Canadian Bankclerk, by J. P. Buschlen
+
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