“Was he Fife, Robert? What did he say?”
“He said, ‘O man, you’re right! You’re right! I am Fife! Bone and blood, nerve and brain, I am Fife!’”
“Then, Robert?”
“I offered my hand, and he clasped it between his two large brown hands, and said, ‘Sit a few minutes. I want a word with you.’ So he asked my name and what I was in Texas for. I told him that we had been driven from Memphis by fever and the threat of cholera, and had not escaped the terror either in New Orleans, Galveston or Harrisburg. He readily understood the position, and inquired next if we intended to return to Memphis, as soon as it was safe to do so? I told him we intended to remain in Austin if I could find any way in which it would be possible to make a living.
“‘How did you make it in Memphis?’ he asked and I answered, ‘As a professional accountant.’
“‘Accountant!’ he cried, leaping to his feet. ‘Great Scot, you are the very man now wanted! Come, Bentley. I must go to the House with this news. And I must see Raymond before he goes to his office.’
“He was so impetuous, that it was impossible to question him, and in such a hurry that I had hardly time to put my hat on properly; so in a few minutes we were mounting the long flight of steps leading to the Capitol entrance. Here we met Mr. Raymond, who is state treasurer, and Mr. Scot almost shouted, ‘Here’s your accountant, Raymond! Here’s a leal Scot from the city o’ Glasgo, and later from the city o’ 201 Memphis! Here’s the very man you and your legislators are wanting!’”
“And then what, Robert?”
“Then Bentley laughed heartily, and introduced me to Mr. Raymond, and while Scot and Bentley sat down on the top step, and fanned themselves with their Panama hats, I had a talk with Mr. Raymond, the result of which was that he took me to a committee room, and showed me its long table piled high and higher with bills and papers.
“‘We have had three men here,’ said Mr. Raymond, ‘and all of them have thrown up the job. Will you try it?’ I told him I would gladly do so, and then he hoped I would manage it; and I answered, I had never yet seen the tangle of figures I could not manage.