shoulders and slightly knock-kneed. He was perhaps forty years old, his hair was getting thin, and his dark eyes snapped behind a pair of glasses. Just now, instead of snapping, his eyes twinkled.

"What in thunder have you been trying to do?" he exclaimed.

As he leafed over the pages of the copying-book his mirth came nearer and nearer the surface, until at last he was laughing aloud and with much enjoyment.

"Cheer up," he said, seeing the expression of Evan's face, "we'll let them go this time without re-writing."

Then he showed the young clerk how to copy a letter without spoiling both the letter and the tissue-paper pages.

"Thank you, Mr. Robb," said Evan, earnestly.

While the dainty teller fretted in his cage, like a rare species of wild animal, the manager dug Nelson out of his mess and tried to make light of the disaster.

"We all have to learn," he said kindly.

Sam Robb might have been either a diplomat or merely a good-hearted human being. At any rate, Evan Nelson resolved, after the tone of Robb's words had penetrated, that he would always do his utmost to please the manager.

The return of Porter Perry, alias the "Bonehead," was heralded by loud scuffling over by the ledgers. A string of oaths escaped ("escaped" is hardly the way to express it) the ledger-keeper, William Watson, as Porter approached.

"You ——! why didn't you get back here sooner?"

The teller raised his blonde head.

"Enough of that profanity, Watson," he said, peremptorily.

Perry, also called "the porter," dodged Watson, and, muttering a savage growl, shot across the office to the collection desk.

"Here, you," said Mr. Robb, "get busy on this mail. Where have you been—playing checkers in the library or shooting craps on the sidewalk?"

Porter still had his hat on. He took the hint when the manager said, half-mischievously, "Judging by the size of the mail, don't you think you had better stay a while?"

The remainder of the day's work meant confusion and headaches for Evan. Before going to his boarding-house for supper he took a walk by himself along one of the back streets of Mt. Alban. A song his sister used to sing seemed to dwell in the very air about him. It associated itself with home memories and sent a thrill through him.

Mt. Alban was only thirty miles from Hometon, and yet Evan felt that he was gone from home forever. So he was—if he continued to work in the bank. He knew that he would be able to get home only for an occasional week-end; nor were the Hometon trains convenient to bank hours. There was no branch of the bank in Hometon, and he would, consequently, never be located there. When the first move came it would take him still further away.

Evan sauntered, with his thoughts, past comfortable homes fronted with lawns and shaded by weeping willows. There is a peculiar melancholia about a May day; it had an effect on the young bankclerk. He walked by hedges beyond the end of Mt. Alban's asphalt out into the suburbs. Spring birds sang their thanks to Nature, and to the homesick heart a bird's singing is sadness. It is natural for such a heart to seek quiet. Evan had no desire for company. He wanted to think, all by himself. His mind travelled in the one circle, the arcs of which were home, school and the bank. Yes, and Frankie Arling!

Although only seventeen he had a tenacious way of liking a girl; and Frankie had always appealed to him. He thought of her as he walked by the hedges. It was she, indeed, who helped him, more than anything else, to forget the ordeal of his first few days' clerkship. He shuddered when he thought of the hundred and one inscrutable books in the office, so well known to the teller and Watson, and a shiver accompanied thought of mail and copying-books; but he viewed matters from a different angle when Frankie came forward in his mind. How worldly-wise he would be when he went home, and what a hit he would make with his own money in the ice-cream places of Hometon! Wouldn't Frankie be proud of him!

Exclamation marks hardly do justice to Evan's enthusiasm as he allowed himself to speculate on the future. Being "good stuff" at bottom, he forced himself, finally, on this May-day walk, to look at the sunlight on the lawns and trees; and when he doubled back to the boarding-house it was with a good imitation of his old football energy. At table he spoke blithely to the guests, and was quite gay during soup. Cold roast beef brought a slight chill with it. Cake had something of a sour flavor. He drank his tea in silence.

In the evening he declined an invitation to a party, extended to him over the telephone, at the bank. After sweeping out the office he perched himself on a stool and wrote a long letter home. Before daylight had quite disappeared he "wound" the vault combination, seriously, faithfully, and crept up the back stairs to his bed above the bank's treasure. He soberly inspected a heavy revolver, placed it on a chair beside the bed, and retired with a sound not unlike a groan.

Perry came in late and raised a dreadful hubbub. He smoked cigarettes in the room, whistled the raggiest rags and tried his best to make things uncomfortable for the new man. Nelson ground his teeth beneath the sheets and wished he had been born strong.

The first official question Evan was asked the following morning concerned the winding of the combination.

"Never forget that," enjoined Watson.

"Mr. Nelson," called the teller from his cage, "come here." Evan obeyed the summons.

"Go over to the B—— Bank and ask them for their general ledger."

"All right, sir," said Nelson, meekly, and taking his cap from a peg went out to execute the commission.

He had hardly disappeared when Watson walked to the phone and called up the B—— Bank, informing them of Nelson's mission and asking them to send him on to some other bank. It was half an hour before the junior returned; he had been all over town; the report he brought with him was this:

"I found out it had just been sent back here."

Now the general ledger of a bank contains a summary of all business done. It would not do for one bank to see the general ledger of another. Neither the branches nor the clerks of one bank may have business secrets in common with another bank; of course it is all right for head offices and general managers to get their heads together in such small matters as keeping down the rate of interest and curtailing loans—but then all competitors should unite against that great enemy, the public.

Evan was given a copy of "Rules and Regulations" to study while waiting for the "Bonehead" to get his drafts ready for delivery. He was pointed to the clause on secrecy and commanded to memorize it forthwith.

The new junior soon discovered that Porter Perry was something of a joke among Mt. Alban merchants. The "Bonehead" had sometime and somewhere earned the dignity of his title. The way he approached customers about a draft was ridiculous even to Evan—and it meant something for Evan to have a definite idea about anything these apprenticeship days. Remarks passed between store clerks, and the giggles and smirks of girls behind counters, did not relieve the embarrassment Nelson felt at being sub-associated with Perry, and worse still, the compulsory recipient of loudly bawled pointers. In proportion as Nelson felt humiliated did Perry feel dignified and important.

The Bonehead had a wonderful faculty for calling people by their first names on the street. This, he doubtless argued, would impress the new "swipe" with a sense of his (Porter's) popularity. It does not take long for boys in a bank to conceive a high and mighty regard for position.

Back to the office from their morning round, Perry took it upon himself to teach Evan the mysteries of the Collection Register. After half an hour's faithful instruction the teller came along and inspected the work. Two dozen drafts had been entered wrong; "Drawer" was mixed up with "Endorser," dates of issue