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 furt