The Argosy, April 1916 — page 185: what you’re looking at

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

THE DANGEROUS DAY. “Hello! hello!” she gave back. you, Tom?” I hitched my chair closer to the desk and beamed into the black-rubber mouthpiece. “Hello, deary!” I answered. “This is a pleasant surprise. For a hard-working man to be greeted by his sweetheart’s voice just as he sits down at his desk to begin the day! You are my sweetheart, aren’t—”’ “Oh, Tom, stop!” she cried. ‘Stop and listen to me—don’t be silly now, but listen, listen!” “Y’m not silly,” I informed her. “I’d only be that if I didn’t love you to distrac- tion. And—” “Tom!” Molly earnestly broke in upon me once more. ‘Will you listen to me? Don’t say another word, but just listen!” The excitement in her tone sobered me at once. | “Has anything happened?” I asked quickly. “Yes!” she flung back at me over the wire desperately. “Something fas hap- pened!” “You don’t mean—?” I began. “Listen!” she hurried on. ‘Every mo- ment counts! I’ve been trying for the past fifteen minutes to get you on the phone to —to tell you about last night and what I heard.” “Ves. Go on.” *“Have you found it?” she blurted out. “Found what?” I asked. I heard her give a despairing groan. “Quick, dear!” she continued, with a re- turn to her former tone of breathless excite- ment. ‘Look around your office for it. A black-leather wallet— “Hello!” I cried out excitedly in turn. ‘“What’s that you say?” “Pick up the black-leather pocketbook you'll find somewhere on the floor of your office!” Molly quickly repeated. ‘‘Listen, Tom. I heard uncle talking with a friend of his—a man in the optical business—last night. You remember he said he would give you his ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to our getting married in a few days? Well, it seems that he wants to test your honesty first. “T don’t know whether I ever mentioned it to you or not, but uncle has a sister who married a man who turned out to be a thief. He’s serving a term in a Western peni- tentiary now. And then there was a cousin of his who married a man who afterward went wrong—there was something about some money missing in the firm where he “Is that 175 worked, and soon after he disappeared and has never been heard of since. It seems that Uncle Peter is obsessed with the idea of making sure that the man who marries me, whoever he may be, is honest—Hello, are you listening?” she broke off to inquire. “Yes, yes!” I breathlessly reassured her. “Tell me what you heard last night. Quick!” ‘T heard uncle planning a test that would ‘prove whether you were honest or not,” Molly went on. ‘He was going down to your offce this morning at half-past seven, before you get there, and wait around till he saw one of the scrubwomen unlock your door with her pass-key to go in and clean up the place. Then he was going to step in and ask for you. ~ “When the woman wasn’t looking he’d drop a bill-fold with a lot of money in it on the floor. about your office being full of men all day long, and he knew you’d think, when you spied the pocketbook and picked it up, that some one of them had dropped it. If you returned it to the person whose card was inside, that would prove you were honest. But—” _ “Whose card was in it?” I interrupted feverishly. “One of the cards of uncle’s friend, the man with the optical goods store, that I told you he was talking it over with last night,” Molly answered. ‘You told uncle that not all the people who came into your office to buy those small sets of automobile tools were canvassers. Some of them were owners of Flivver cars themselves, who couldn’t wait to find an agent who sold the repair kits, and so came straight to you to buy them. You’d suppose it was one of them who’d dropped the pocketbook. “By putting Mr. Og’s card in it he could find out if you returned the pocketbook to him, or if you didn’t. But, oh, Tom, you will find it and take it right up to Mr. Og’s store, won’t you? Then uncle will be per- fectly satisfied to let you marry me—” “T’ll try my best to find it!”’ I promised her through my clenched teeth. ‘And now, dearest, every moment counts. I'll have to ring off and dash back out there in the hall to see if it’s still lying—” “No, no—Tom! Wait, you don’t un- derstand! ” Molly cried out to detain me. “T said uncle dropped it on the floor of your office, not in the hall—” “Maybe he did!” I muttered to myself, COMmiCloo® Cc SS He remembered what you'd said . C@