He took the check from the unresisting Mendenhall, spread it out on the desk with a sprawling gesture, tore it to strips with the same impetuous vehemence, and threw it in the waste-basket.  After this brief outburst of anger his good humor returned.  “Twelve-fifty.  Here you are.  No mistake this time.  Say, old man, that’s the drinks on me—­come along!”

“Thank you, I never drink,” returned Mendenhall primly.  He had not relished the roughness with which the other had snatched the check from him, though making allowance for the natural annoyance of one who had been betrayed into a mortifying mistake.

“All the better, all the better.  Seldom do myself, but sometimes—­Have a cigar?  No?  Well, I must toddle along!”

It may here be mentioned that during his moment of impulsive vexation Mr. Britt had inconsiderately substituted for the “Commercial” check another, precisely similar save for the important particular that it lacked the Mendenhall indorsement.  The original had slipped between the leaves of Britt’s check book, under cover of his large hands.  Those hands were most expert in various amusing and adroit feats of legerdemain, though Mr. Britt’s modesty led him to a becoming, if unusual, reticence in this regard.  The substitute, as we have seen, was in the waste-basket.

Just before three Britt ran heavily up the steps of the First National, puffing down the corridor, cocking a hasty eye at the clock as he came.

“Hey, there, sonny!  I was almost too late, wasn’t I?” was his irreverent greeting to the cashier.  “Time to cash this before closing up?” he demanded breathlessly, but with unabated cheerfulness.  He flopped the check over.  “Mendenhall’s indorsement.  Hi!  Mr. President!  Just a minute!  I’m a stranger here, but if you’ll let us slip in at a side door I’ll trot around and fetch Mendenhall.  Need this money to-night.”

The president took the check from the indignant young cashier, nodded at the familiar signature with the cabalistic peculiarities which attested its authenticity, glanced indulgently at the bobbing white head in window, with difficulty suppressing a smile.

“It will not be necessary, Mr.—­Mr. Britt,” he said courteously.  “Not necessary at all.  You have an account here, I believe?”

“It won’t be here long,” retorted Britt, with garrulous good nature.  “Draw it all out next week.  Eleven, twelve—­and fifty.  Thanks to you.  There goes the clock.  Good day!”

“Quite an odd character, that Mr. Britt?” said the president casually at the club that night.  “Boyish old chap.”

“Yes, isn’t he?” said Mendenhall, folding his paper.  “I sold him a pretty stiff bill of goods this morning.  Warmish, I take it.  He’s going to settle here.”

“Friend of yours?”

“Oh, no, I never saw him before.”

“Why, you indorsed his check for twelve hundred and fifty,” said the president, interested, but not alarmed.  Doubtless the man had references.  Besides, his face was a letter of credit in itself.