TAKING up his satchel¹, the merchant strode heavily from the room. Doubting if he had heard aright, Walton tore open the envelope and took out the bills. He spread them on the desk; he fumbled² them with quivering fingers; he took out a big magnifying glass and essayed to examine them one by one, but his excitement and perturbation rendered it impossible. Dropping his hand on his call-bell, he gave a sharp ring, and Toby Lassiter came in quickly. Brushing the money toward his clerk, Walton said:

“See if they are counterfeit³. By gum!”

The clerk examined them with the glass while Walton watched him with staring eyes.

“They seem to me to be all right, Mr. Walton,” Toby said, wonderingly, as he laid the bills down.

“I reckon they are—my Lord, I reckon they are!” the banker said, in his throat. “Credit it on my private account, Toby. Credit me with three—my Lord, I didn’t think—I had no idea that the dang fellow—no, I’ll attend to the money. Toby, you run out and see where he goes. He may make for a hotel, or he may—but hurry!”

Twenty minutes later Toby came back and found Walton still at his desk, the money before him; his face had taken on an ashen⁴ tinge⁵, the eye he raised had a lacklustre expression.

“Well?” he said, eagerly.

“I missed him for the first few minutes,” the clerk said. “He was on the way to the train. I took the belt-line down. He was on the car ahead. I was just in time to see him board the Atlanta special.”

“So he’s gone?”

“Yes, he’s gone, Mr. Walton.”

The old man stared helplessly for a minute into the puzzled face of his clerk, and then he drew the pad to him on which he had written the name of his caller.

“Me ‘n’ him had a tiff,” he said. “We had a sort o’ tiff—I reckon you might call it that—after he had told me a long cock-and-bull tale about Fred reforming, and I laughed at him. I reckon I was rough. Then he threw this money at me all in a

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