He came
into Dunderbunk recently as executor of his friend Damer, a year ago bored
to death by a silly wife.

Churm's bristly aspect and incisive manner made him a sharp contrast to
Brummage. The latter personage was flabby in flesh, and the oppressively
civil counter-jumper style of his youth had grown naturally into a
deportment of most imposing pomposity.

The Tenth Director listened to the President's recitative of their
difficulties, chorused by the Board.

"Gentlemen," said Director Churm, "you want two things. The first is
Money!"

He pronounced this cabalistic word with such magic power that all the air
seemed instantly filled with a cheerful flight of gold American eagles,
each carrying a double eagle on its back and a silver dollar in its claws;
and all the soil of America seemed to sprout with coin, as after a shower
a meadow sprouts with the yellow buds of the dandelion.

"Money! yes, Money!" murmured the Directors.

It seemed a word of good omen, now.

"The second thing," resumed the newcomer, "is a Man!"

The Directors looked at each other and did not see such a being.

"The actual Superintendent of Dunderbunk is a dunderhead," said Churm.

"Pun!" cried Sam Gwelp, waking up from a snooze.

Several of the Directors, thus instructed, started a complimentary laugh.

"Order, gentlemen! Orrderr!" said the President, severely, rapping with a
paper-cutter.

"We must have a Man, not a Whiffler!" Churm continued. "And I have one in
my eye."

Everybody examined his eye.

"Would you be so good as to name him?" said Old Brummage, timidly.

He wanted to see a Man, but feared the strange creature might be
dangerous.

"Richard Wade," says Churm. They did not know him. The name sounded
forcible.

"He has been in California," the nominator said.

A shudder ran around the green table. They seemed to see a frowzy
desperado, shaggy as a bison, in a red shirt and jackboots, hung about the
waist with an assortment of six-shooters and bowie-knives, and standing
against a background of mustangs, monte-banks, and lynch-law.

"We must get Wade," Churm says, with authority. "He knows Iron by heart.
He can handle Men. I will back him with my blank check, to any amount, to
his order."

Here a murmur of applause, swelling to a cheer, burst from the Directors.

Everybody knew that the Geological Bank deemed Churm's deposits the
fundamental stratum of its wealth. They lay there in the vaults, like
underlying