ettlewick
National Bank Examiner

"Oh--er--will you walk around inside, Mr.--er--Nettlewick. Your
first visit--didn't know your business, of course. Walk right
around, please."

The examiner was quickly inside the sacred precincts of the bank,
where he was ponderously introduced to each employee in turn by Mr.
Edlinger, the cashier--a middle-aged gentleman of deliberation,
discretion, and method.

"I was kind of expecting Sam Turner round again, pretty soon," said
Mr. Edlinger. "Sam's been examining us now, for about four years. I
guess you'll find us all right, though, considering the tightness
in business. Not overly much money on hand, but able to stand the
storms, sir, stand the storms."

"Mr. Turner and I have been ordered by the Comptroller to exchange
districts," said the examiner, in his decisive, formal tones. "He is
covering my old territory in Southern Illinois and Indiana. I will
take the cash first, please."

Perry Dorsey, the teller, was already arranging his cash on the
counter for the examiner's inspection. He knew it was right to a
cent, and he had nothing to fear, but he was nervous and flustered.
So was every man in the bank. There was something so icy and swift,
so impersonal and uncompromising about this man that his very
presence seemed an accusation. He looked to be a man who would never
make nor overlook an error.

Mr. Nettlewick first seized the currency, and with a rapid, almost
juggling motion, counted it by packages. Then he spun the sponge cup
toward him and verified the count by bills. His thin, white fingers
flew like some expert musician's upon the keys of a piano. He dumped
the gold upon the counter with a crash, and the coins whined and
sang as they skimmed across the marble slab from the tips of his
nimble digits. The air was full of fractional currency when he came
to the halves and quarters. He counted the last nickle and dime.
He had the scales brought, and he weighed every sack of silver
in the vault. He questioned Dorsey concerning each of the cash
memoranda--certain checks, charge slips, etc., carried over from the
previous day's work--with unimpeachable courtesy, yet with something
so mysteriously momentous in his frigid manner, that the teller was
reduced to pink cheeks and a stammering tongue.

This newly-imported examiner was so different from Sam Turner. It
had been Sam's way to enter the bank with a shout, pass the cigars,
and tell the latest stories he had