s first impulse, when he
caught sight of his old clerk, was to leave the line himself; then
the nobility which was struggling for life within him asserted itself
and made him ashamed of his shame. He stood still with his head a
little higher, and moved on with the slowly moving line of men which
crawled towards the desk like a caterpillar. He saw Allbright turn
away rejected with a feeling of pity; the old man looked dejected.
Carroll reflected with a sensation of pride that at least he did not
owe him. He himself was rejected promptly after he had owned to his
age. The man four behind him was chosen. He was a very young man,
scarcely more than a boy, unless his looks belied him. He was
distinctly handsome, with the boy-doll style of beauty--curly, dark
hair, rosy cheeks, and a small, very carefully tended mustache. He
wore a very long and fashionable coat, and was evidently pleasantly
conscious of its flop around his ankles. His handsome face wore an
expression of pert triumph as he passed on into the inner office....
Carroll, who had lingered with an idle curiosity to ascertain who
was the successful applicant, heard a voice so near his ear that it
whistled. The voice was exceedingly bitter, even malignant.

"That's the way it goes, these times; that's the way it always goes,"
said the voice.

Carroll turned and gazed at the speaker, a man probably older than
himself; if not, he looked older, since his hair was quite white and
his carriage not so good.

"The employers nowadays are a pack of fools, a pack of fools!" said
the man. His long, rather handsome face, a face which should have
been mild in its natural state was twisted into a thousand sardonic
wrinkles. "A pack of fools!" he repeated. "Here they'll go and hire a
little whippersnapper like that every time, instead of a man who has
had experience and knows how to do the work, just because he's young.
Young! What's that? You'd think what they wanted was a man to keep
their books straight. I can keep books if I do say so, and that young
snip can't. Lord! He was in Avin & Mann's with me. Why, I tell you he
can't add up a column of figures three inches long straight, to save
his neck. The books will be in a pretty state. I'll give him just ten
days before they'll have to get an expert in to straighten out
things. Hope they will; serve 'em right. Here I am, can't get a job
to save my life, because my hair has turned and I've got a few more
years over my head, and