Argosy and Railroad Man's Magazine, Vol. 107 No. 3 — page 61: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ALIAS THE ANGLEWORM. Worms without angles have been known to turn, and the fact is duly chronicled in the world’s best literature. Jimmy, wondering where he should turn next, suddenly took all the specimens of typewriting gathered in Coalport when try- ing to sell machines, and began comparing them with the photographic copy of the letter. He began with: The quick, brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. And ended with the last specimen ob- tained befdre he had gone into the lot back of the Mansion House and inspected the phaeton under the shed, ere visiting Vivian Baldwin’s: office. None of the typewriting was the same. With the air of one saying farewell to all he holds dear on earth, Jimmy placed the ribbon copy of the letter he had dictated to Vivian Baldwin alongside the photo- graphic copy of the one bearing Cashier Phelps’s alleged signature. It was patent, even to the non-expert, that the same machine had typed both let- ters. Mr. Bugbee, using the ear in his inspec- tion, since the eye was estopped by a tiny key in a keyhole made for it, heard these sequential rustles as Jimmy put all the specimens back into his portfolio, and then took up something else. It is the little things in life that count. But for that little key, Mr. Bugbee would have had a clear and unobstructed vision of a symbol of more golden fleece than he had seen his guest display. Jimmy was sitting half sidewise to the- door of his room, staring moodily at a piece of paper. The words “ Twenty-eight thqu- sand dollars ” appeared on it, and also the figures “$28,000.” And over it was a protectograph stamp for the same sum. The check was also “ certified,” by the cashier of the Pittsburgh bank on which it was drawn, to be good for the sum for which it was drawn; and the signer, al- thouglt not using the name of “ James Stuart,” had signed in a handwriting so similar to that signature on the Mansion House register that even a non-handwriting window, 403 expert would have known it was the same man. But the check was not drawn to the order of. ‘“‘ Norman Baldwin,” neither had it been indorsed on its back by him. The first name so appearing was “ Adolphus Smith,” and below was a deposit stamp, signed by ‘* John Snodgrass.”’ The man in the room carefully attached several other papers together with brass fasteners having big heads and long, pliant . legs, which could be spread apart or pushed together again at will. Several of these he dropped in his pocket, abstractedly, as he returned the papers to his portfolio. The papers referred to a man calling himself Norman Baldwin, and all carried the same legend: Whereabouts at present unknown. Then, as narrated, Jimmy punched his pillows, turned down the bed, turned out the light, raised his shade and window, as one does who likes fresh air while he re- poses. Mr. Bugbee, also as narrated, at this point went back to the lobby, leaving Jimmy sitting pensively On the ledge of the now and again looking down through the clearing mist to the roof of the old shed below, and now and again feeling for possible wrinkles in the right sleeve of his coat. It did not wrinkle any more than any _ garment might in damp. weather. Jimmy kept on thinking -for a quarter of an hour, as men do when their thoughts are somber and they are very much ab- sorbed in trying to decide things. He was thinking how much more “ in- digo ” there was in this particular day than Miss Baldwin had dreamed when she had tactfully asked him to get rid of the “blues ” by coming to the theater, and he had impulsively accepted. For a young man calling himself Norman Baldwin had given Jimmy the original of that photo- graphic letter in Pittsburgh, and thereafter Jimmy had been shorn, through its use, of much golden fleece. Jimmy liked music very much. He had also liked Vivian Baldwin, when first seeing her on the car, wery much; and when next COM cloooks. com