op. What are
you doing here, Brower? Can't they keep you in C's? What's the matter
with the clearing anyway? ..... Nelson, I'm going to put this in your
charge, and I want you to see that the ledgers have their stuff by
ten-thirty at latest."

Thus another responsibility was loaded on the creaking shoulders of the
cash-book man; but nothing was said of added remuneration. Every week
or month, as a man increases his speed or loses his power of resisting
imposition, he is screwed more and more tightly to the "wall," which,
in banking, means a desk.

"Do you know what you are?" said Johnson to Evan, when the accountant
had gone. "You're a darn idiot. Why don't you kick?"

"Aw, shut up," Marks butted in, "how's a fellow going to get out of it?
Why, Johnsy, you'd have a hemorrhage if you ever let yourself dream of
talking back to the accountant."

Mr. Charon might stop the noise, but he could never put an end to the
conversation of the clearing men. They rattled on, like their adding
machines, jabbing back and forth and getting off speeches that are
never heard in vaudeville, but still turning out the figures at a rapid
rate. They worked mechanically, and their minds had to find diversion.
That it was not valuable diversion was due to the environment. In the
first place the work was monotonous, and the mind naturally sought a
channel of entertainment, rather than of thought; in the second place,
one got accustomed to the line of talk popular with the boys and unless
he mixed with them he was out of the swim and in a cold, silent current
of his own.

Sometimes the diversion Evan permitted himself took the form of Frankie
Arling. It was not often, now, that he thought of her seriously--that
is, as his wife. Seven years was too long a time to look ahead. He
could not, after a good many months in the world of business, realize
Frankie as he had done in those old school-days; but he could still
think of her, in an ideal way.

Would Frankie be proud of him if she could see him handling that
mysterious jumble of figures called the "cash book?" He wondered how
the "city" way, which he believed himself to be acquiring, would appeal
to the sweet country girl. He smiled as he thought of summer
vacation--not such a great while off--when he should go back to Hometon
and--and what? He did not know. He couldn't carry back tales of
success, for his salary was only four hundred dollars a year. He
couldn't go back wel