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 c