“No,” said Emanuel almost regretfully; “I'm afraid not. All my people live South, so far as I know.”
“Well, anyhow, you'd enjoy knowing old Bob,” went on the companionable Mr. Caruthers. “Have a smoke?”
He produced both cigars and cigarettes. Emanuel said he never smoked, so Mr. Caruthers lighted a cigar.
Up to this point the conversation had been more or less general. Now, somehow, it took a rather personal and direct trend. Mr. Caruthers proved to be an excellent listener, although he asked quite a number of leading questions as they went along. He evinced a kindly curiosity regarding Emanuel's connection with the bank. He was interested in banks, it seemed; his uncle, now deceased, had been, he said, a very prominent banker in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Emanuel had a rôle that was new to him; a pleasing rôle though. Nearly always in company he had to play audience; now he held the centre of the stage, with another listening to what he might say, and, what was more, listening with every sign of, deep attention. He spoke at length, Emanuel did, of the bank, its size, its resources, its liabilities, its physical appearance and its personnel, leading off with its president and scaling down to its black janitor. He referred to Mr. Blair's crustiness of manner toward persons of lesser authority, which manner, he hastened to explain, was quite all right if you only understood Mr. Blair's little ways.
He mentioned in passing that Herb Kivil, the cashier, was addicted to tennis, and that on Tuesdays and Fridays, when Herb left early to play tennis, he, Moon, closed up the vault and took over certain other duties which ordinarily fell to Herb. From the bank he progressed by natural stages to Mrs. Morrill's boarding house and from there to his own individual tastes and likings. In this connection it was inevitable that the subject of clarinet playing should obtrude. Continuing along this strain Emanuel felt moved to disclose his principal object in journeying to Louisville at this particular time.
“There's a store there that carries a clarinet that I'm sort of interested in,” he stated—but got no farther, for here Mr. Caruthers broke in on him.
“Well, sir, it's a mighty little world after all,” he exclaimed. “First you drop your punch check out of your hat and I come along and pick it up, and I sit down here and we get acquainted. Then I find out that I used to know a man in your town—Abner Perkins.”
“Alfred,” corrected Mr. Moon gently.
“Sure—Alfred Perkins. That's what I meant to say but my tongue slipped. Then you tell me your name, and it turns out I've got a good friend that, if he's not your own cousin, ought to be on account of the name being the same. One coincidence right after another! And then, on top of all that, you tell me you want to buy a new clarinet. And that's the most curious part of it all, because—— Say, Moon, you must have heard of Galling & Moore, of Boston, New York, and Paris, France.”