"Funny thing: when I first came here
James Neal was close as a clam; never a word out of him. Paid no
attention to anybody, all gloom. Now look at him helping everybody! Best
old scout in the office!"
As he nodded his head in emphasis, his eyeglasses trembled on his
nose--but they stuck.
"I've not got a better friend in the whole town than James Neal, and I
know it," he added, "and I guess that's true of everybody in the
office!"
It was true that Mr. Neal and the chief clerk had become fast friends.
They had come to spend their Sundays together, and even to share
confidences, and so it was natural that when Mr. Neal saw the face for
the third time he should be moved to tell his friend about it. This
telling of his secret was epochal in Mr. Neal's life.
The two men sat on a bench in a more or less secluded part of Bronx
Park. Mr. Neal looked off among the trees as he told the story of the
face hesitatingly, often in difficulty for the right word, the light of
the mystic in his glowing eyes. The chief clerk listened attentively,
his cane across his knees, his lean face serious. His eyes bored into
the very mind of his friend with their keen gaze. When Mr. Neal told of
his failure to find the man with the good face in the house on Third
Avenue, his friend shook his head definitely.
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