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“No one yet,” returned the teller, “but,” he added parenthetically, “Judge Boompointer, you know, was speaking to you about his son.”

“Yes, I know that.” To Randolph: “Go round to my private room and wait for me. I won’t be as long as your friend last night.” Then he added to a negro porter, “Show him round there.”

He moved away, stopping at one or two desks to give an order to the clerks, and once before the railing to speak to a depositor. Randolph followed the negro into the hall, through a “board room,” and into a handsomely furnished office. He had not to wait long. In a few moments the president appeared with an older man whose gray side whiskers, cut with a certain precision, and whose black and white checked neckerchief, tied in a formal bow, proclaimed the English respectability of the period. At the president’s dictation he took down Randolph’s name, nativity, length of residence, and occupation in California. This concluded, the president, glancing at his companion, said briefly,–

“Well?”

“He had better come to-morrow morning at nine,” was the answer.

“And ask for Mr. Dingwall, the deputy manager,” added the president, with a gesture that was at once an introduction and a dismissal to both.

Randolph had heard before of this startling brevity of San Francisco business detail, yet he lingered until the door closed on Mr. Dingwall. His heart was honestly full.

“You have been very kind, sir,” he stammered.

“I haven’t run half the risks of that chap last night,” said the president grimly, the least tremor of a smile on his set mouth.

“If you would only let me know what I can do to thank you,” persisted Randolph.

“Trust the man that trusts you, and hang on to your trust,” returned the president curtly, with a parting nod.

Elated and filled with high hopes as Randolph was, he felt some trepidation in returning to his hotel. He had to face his landlord with some explanation of the bank’s inquiry. The landlord might consider him an impostor, and request him to leave, or, more dreadful still, insist upon keeping the bag. He thought of the parting words of the president, and resolved upon “hanging on to his trust,” whatever happened. But he was agreeably surprised to find that he was received at the office with a certain respect not usually shown to the casual visitor. “Your caller turned up to-day”–Randolph started–“from the Eureka bank,” continued the clerk. “Sorry we could not give your name, but you know you only left a deposit in your letter and sent a messenger for your key yesterday afternoon. When you came you went straight to your room. Perhaps you would like to register now.” Randolph no longer hesitated, reflecting that he could explain it all later to his unknown benefactor, and wrote his name boldly. But he was still more astonished when the clerk continued: “I reckon it was a case of identifying you for a draft–it often happens here–and we’d have been glad to do it for you. But the bank clerk seemed satisfied with out description of you–you’re easily described, you know” (this in a parenthesis, complimentarily intended)–“so it’s all right. We can give you a better room lower down, if you’re going to stay longer.” Not knowing whether to laugh or to be embarrassed at this extraordinary conclusion of the blunder, Randolph answered that he had just come from the bank, adding, with a pardonable touch of youthful pride, that he was entering the bank’s employment the next day.

Another equally agreeable surprise met him on his arrival there the next morning. Without any previous examination or trial he was installed at once as a corresponding clerk in the place of one just promoted to a sub-agency in the interior. His handwriting, his facility of composition, had all been taken for granted, or perhaps predicated upon something the president had discerned in that one quick, absorbing glance. He ventured to express the thought to his neighbor.