“Only in a general way.”
“Wa’al,” said Mr. Timson, “I c’n tell ye; an’, what’s more, I c’n tell ye, young man, ’t you hain’t no idee of what you’re undertakin’, an’ ef you don’t wish you was back in New York ’fore you git through I ain’t no guesser.”
“That is possible,” said John readily, recalling his night and his breakfast that morning.
“Yes, sir,” said the other. “Yes, sir; if you do what I’ve had to do, you’ll do the hull darned thing, an’ nobody to help you but Pele Hopkins, who don’t count fer a row o’ crooked pins. As fer’s Dave’s concerned,” asserted the speaker with a wave of his hands, “he don’t know no more about bankin’ ’n a cat. He couldn’t count a thousan’ dollars in an hour, an’, as for addin’ up a row o’ figures, he couldn’t git it twice alike, I don’t believe, if he was to be hung for’t.”
“He must understand the meaning of his own books and accounts, I should think,” remarked John.
“Oh,” said Chet scornfully, “anybody c’d do that. That’s easy ’nough; but as fur ’s the real bus’nis is concerned, he don’t have nothin’ to do with it. It’s all ben left to me: chargin’ an’ creditin’, postin’, individule ledger, gen’ral ledger, bill-book, discount register, tickler, for’n register, checkin’ off the N’York accounts, drawin’ off statemunts f’m the ledgers an’ bill-book, writin’ letters—why, the’ ain’t an hour ’n the day in bus’nis hours some days that the’s an hour ’t I ain’t busy ’bout somethin’. No, sir,” continued Chet, “Dave don’t give himself no trouble about the bus’nis. All he does is to look after lendin’ the money, an’ seein’ that it gits paid when the time comes, an’ keep track of how much money the’ is here an’ in N’York, an’ what notes is comin’ due—an’ a few things like that, that don’t put pen to paper, ner take an hour of his time. Why, a man’ll come in an’ want to git a note done, an’ it’ll be ‘All right,’ or, ‘Can’t spare the money today,’ all in a minute. He don’t give it no thought at all, an’ he ain’t ’round here half the time. Now,” said Chet, “when I work fer a man I like to have him ’round so ’t I c’n say to him: ‘Shall I do it so? or shall I do it so? shall I? or shan’t I?’ an’ then when I make a mistake—‘s anybody’s liable to—he’s as much to blame ’s I be.”
“I suppose, then,” said John, “that you must have to keep Mr. Harum’s private accounts also, seeing that he knows so little of details. I have been told that he is interested in a good many matters besides this business.”
“Wa’al,” replied Timson, somewhat disconcerted, “I suppose he must keep ’em himself in some kind of a fashion, an’ I don’t know a thing about any outside matters of his’n, though I suspicion he has got quite a few. He’s got some books in that safe” (pointing with his finger) “an’ he’s got a safe in the vault, but if you’ll believe me”—and the speaker looked as if he hardly expected it—“I hain’t never so much as seen the inside of either one on ’em. No, sir,” he declared, “I hain’t no more idee of what’s in them safes ’n you have. He’s close, Dave Harum is,” said Chet with a convincing motion of the head; “on the hull, the clostest man I ever see. I believe,” he averred, “that if he was to lay out to keep it shut that lightnin’ might strike him square in the mouth an’ it wouldn’t go in an eighth of an inch. An’ yet,” he added, “he c’n talk by the rod when he takes a notion.”
“Must be a difficult person to get on with,” commented John dryly.
“I couldn’t stan’ it no longer,” declared Mr. Timson with the air of one who had endured to the end of virtue, “an’ I says to him the other day, ‘Wa’al,’ I says, ‘if I can’t suit ye, mebbe you’d better suit yourself.’ ”
“Ah!” said John politely, seeing that some response was expected of him; “and what did he say to that?”
“He ast me,” replied Chet, “if I meant by that to throw up the situation. ‘Wa’al,’ I says ‘I’m sick enough to throw up most anythin’,’ I says, ‘along with bein’ found fault with fer nothin’.’ ”
“And then?” queried John, who had received the impression that the motion to adjourn had come from the other side of the house.
“Wa’al,” replied Chet, not quite so confidently, “he said somethin’ about my requirin’ a larger spear of action, an’ that he thought I’d do better on a mile track—some o’ his hoss talk. That’s another thing,” said Timson, changing the subject. “He’s all fer hosses. He’d sooner make a ten-dollar note on a hoss trade than a hunderd right here ’n this office. Many’s the time right in bus’nis hours, when I’ve wanted to ask him how he wanted somethin’ done, he’d be busy talkin’ hoss, an’ wouldn’t pay no attention to me more’n ’s if I wa’n’t there.”
“I am glad to feel,” said John, “that you can not possibly have any unpleasant feeling toward me, seeing that you resigned as you did.”
“Cert’nly not, cert’nly not,” declared Timson, a little uneasily. “If it hadn’t ’a’ ben you, it would ’a’ had to ben somebody else, an’ now I seen you an’ had a talk with you—Wa’al, I guess I better git back into the other room. Dave’s liable to come in any minute. But,” he said in parting, “I will give ye piece of advice: You keep enough laid by to pay your gettin’ back to N’York. You may want it in a hurry,” and with this parting shot the rejected one took his leave.
The bank parlor was lighted by a window and a glazed door in the rear wall, and another
