One morning, however, he was stopped by the darwan (doorkeeper) who told him gruffly that the “Bara Babu did not like to have outsiders hanging about the office”.  The baffled suitor reflected on his miserable position.  He had just eleven rupees and two pice left, which he calculated would last him, with strict economy, for another fortnight.  When they were spent, he would have to return crestfallen to Kadampur.  But could he face the neighbours’ sneers, the servants’ contumely—­worse than all, his wife’s bitter tongue?  No, that was not to be thought of.  It were better to plunge into the river whose turbid waters rolled only a few feet away.

Pulin was roused from this unpleasant train of thought by hearing his name pronounced.  It came from a well-dressed man, who was just entering Messrs. Kerr & Dunlop’s office, welcomed by a salam from the surly doorkeeper.  Pulin was delighted to recognise in the stranger a certain Kisari Mohan Chatterji, who had taught him English in the General Assembly’s College more than a decade back.  In a few words he told his sad story and learnt that Kisari Babu had taken the same step as he himself contemplated, with the result that he was now head clerk in Messrs. Kerr & Dunlop’s export department.  This news augured well for his own ambition, but poor Pulin was disgusted on hearing that no less than three vacancies had occurred in as many weeks, and that all had been filled by relatives of Babu Debnath Lahiri.  Kisari Babu added:  “A junior clerk is to be appointed to-morrow.  Write out an application in your very best hand, with copies of your testimonials, and bring it to me here this evening at five.  I’ll see that it reaches our manager, Henderson Saheb.”  Pulin punctually followed his friend’s advice, and dreamed all night of wealth beyond a miser’s utmost ambition.

On arriving at Messrs. Kerr & Dunlop’s office next morning he joined a crowd of twenty or thirty young men who were bent on a like errand.  His spirits sank to zero, nor were they raised when after hanging about in the rain for nearly two hours the aspirants were told that the vacancy had been filled up.  Thereupon the forlorn group dispersed, cursing their ill-luck and muttering insinuations against Mr. Henderson and his head clerk.  Pulin, however, lingered behind.  By tendering a rupee to the doorkeeper he got a slip of paper and pencil, with which he indited a piteous appeal to Kisari Babu, and a promise that it should reach him.  Presently his friend came out in a desperate hurry, with a stylograph behind his ear, and his hands laden with papers.

“It’s just as I anticipated,” he whispered to Pulin.  “The head clerk has persuaded Henderson Saheb to bestow the post on his wife’s nephew.  But don’t be disheartened.  I will speak to our Saheb about you this very day.  Come here at five to learn the result.”

Pulin did so and was overjoyed to find that he had been appointed probationary clerk in the export department on Rs. 20 per mensem, in supersession of Debnath Babu’s nominee.