After the commonplaces of getting acquainted, the two tacked the boiled dinner.

“Let’s see—­who’s your cashier?” inquired Starr, chewing vigorously behind the mask of his mustache.

“Young fellow named Vaniman.  I have let him take full charge of the bank business.  He seems to know all the ropes.”

“Poor policy, Britt!  Poor policy!” stated the examiner, vehemently.  “Not a word to say against Vaniman—­” He halted on the word and opened his eyes on Britt.  “Vaniman!  A name that sticks.  There was a Vaniman of Verona.  Easy to remember!  There was some sort of a money snarl, as I recollect.”

“It was the young chap’s father.”

“And you’re letting the son run your bank?”

“I’m not the kind that visits the sins of the fathers on the children,” loftily stated the president.  “Furthermore, a burnt child dreads the fire.  I heard a railroad manager say that a trainman who had let an accident happen by his negligence was worth twice as much to the road as he was before.  You don’t say that I made a bad pick, do you?”

“Not a word to say against Vaniman!” repeated Starr, slashing his cabbage.  “I never guess about any proposition—­I go at it!  But what I’m saying to you, Britt, is what I’m saying to all the easy-going country-town bankers.  ’You may have second editions of the Apostle Paul for your cashiers,’ I say, ’but every time you sign a statement of condition without close and careful audit you’re bearing false witness.’  And being a new broom that proposes to sweep clean, I’m tempted to poke it just as hard to slack presidents and directors as I am to an embezzling cashier who has been given plenty of rope to run as he wants! I’m on the job examining banks!” He was a vigorous man, Examiner Starr!  He showed it by the way he went at his corned beef.

President Britt was perturbed; his eyes shifted; he was even pale.  “If that’s the way you feel about it, I hope you’ll give our little bank a good going-over.  I was glad to read of your appointment, Mr. Starr!”

“Uncle Whittum isn’t on this job any longer,” stated the examiner, not needing, in Britt’s case, as a banker, to dwell upon the lax methods of the easy-going predecessor.

A half hour later, Starr, with his unbuttoned fur-lined overcoat outspread as he strode, giving him the aspect of a scaling aeroplane, marched from the tavern to the bank with Britt.

Vaniman had his mouth opened to welcome a man named Barnes, but he was presented to Bank-Examiner Starr and surprise placed him at a disadvantage in the meeting.  The torpor of drowsiness made him appear stupid and ill at ease in the presence of this forceful man who stamped in and proceeded to exploit and enjoy his newly acquired authority.  Mr. Starr hung up his coat and hat and swooped like a hawk on the daybook, at the same time calling for the book of “petty cash.”

“First of all, the finger on the pulse of the patient, Cashier,” he declared, grimly jovial.  “Then we’ll have a look at the tongue, and study the other symptoms.”