in the side room sat down with a
bottle of ale, a cigarette, and some stationery. When he rose, it was to
mail a letter. That done, he went back to his costly little apartment
upon which the rent would be due in a few days. He had the cash in hand:
that was all right. As for the next month, he wondered humorously
whether he would have the wherewithal to meet the recurring bill, not to
mention others. However, the consideration was not weighty enough to
keep him sleepless.

Custom kindly provides its own patent shock-absorbers to all the various
organisms of nature; otherwise the whole regime would perish.
Necessarily a newspaper is among the best protected of organisms against
shock: it deals, as one might say, largely in shocks, and its hand is
subdued to what it works in. Nevertheless, on the following noon The
Ledger office was agitated as it hardly would have been had Brooklyn
Bridge fallen into the East River, or the stalest mummy in the Natural
History Museum shown stirrings of life. A word was passing from eager
mouth to incredulous ear.

Banneker had resigned.

CHAPTER XV

Looking out of the front window, into the decorum of Grove Street, Mrs.
Brashear could hardly credit the testimony of her glorified eyes. Could
the occupant of the taxi indeed be Mr. Banneker whom, a few months
before and most sorrowfully, she had sacrificed to the stern
respectability of the house? And was it possible, as the very elegant
trunk inscribed "E.B.--New York City" indicated, that he was coming back
as a lodger? For the first time in her long and correct professional
career, the landlady felt an unqualified bitterness in the fact that all
her rooms were occupied.

The occupant of the taxi jumped out and ran lightly up the steps.

"How d'you do, Mrs. Brashear. Am I still excommunicated?"

"Oh, Mr. Banneker! I'm _so_ glad to see you. If I could tell you how
often I've blamed myself--"

"Let's forget all that. The point is I've come back."

"Oh, dear! I do hate not to take you in. But there isn't a spot."

"Who's got my old room?"

"Mr. Hainer."

"Hainer? Let's turn him out."

"I would in a minute," declared the ungrateful landlady to whom Mr.
Hainer had always been a model lodger. "But the law--"

"Oh, I'll fix Hainer if you'll fix the room."

"How?" asked the bewildered Mrs. Brashear.

"The room? Just as it used to be. Bed, table, couple of chairs,
bookshelf."

"But Mr. Hainer's things?"

"Store 'em.