THE TRUSTED CLERK 



to make money out of an investment in a * starting 

 price office.' " The central figure in that novel was 

 taken absolutely from life, and he saved himself by 

 his native wit from a conspiracy which consisted of 

 bringing in late wires and suppressing losing telegrams. 

 A man in a big way of business has to trust his head 

 men to the pitch of brotherhood, but nothing can be 

 done, even with the perfect system to prevent fraud, 

 if there be combination to this end. In the course of 

 many years listening to others' woes there have been 

 all sorts of incidents brought before me. 



There is one man we know very well about town 

 whose business was such a one-man affair that he had 

 to put his whole trust in his clerk. That man appar- 

 ently was devoted to him. The Guv'nor saw that 

 his man made a good living, and even after the liberal 

 wages were paid there was very often the query : 

 " Is everything going right ? " That is to say, 

 an extra pound or two would be handed out un- 

 grudgingly if there was any odd thing the clerk was up 

 against. And yet one fine morning the trusted one 

 disappeared with nine hundred and sixty pounds. 



This reminds me that in the employ of a most 

 eminent firm of bankers, the name of which is respected 

 the world over, there have been many trusted sub- 

 ordinates employed at wages equal to that of branch 

 bank managers. It was a blow to the amiability of 

 the firm when one of them disappeared with many 

 hundreds of pounds, and they determined to make an 

 example. I trust it is not divulging inner information 

 when I say another case entirely different occurred in 

 the same establishment. In a certain department of 

 that bank, by some mysterious means, sixty pounds, 

 equalling three twenty-pound notes, disappeared one 

 morning. All inquiry and search proved fruitless. It 



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