d 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