The Project Gutenberg eBook of Josie O'Gorman and the Meddlesome Major, by Emma Speed Sampson This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook. Title: Josie O'Gorman and the Meddlesome Major Author: Emma Speed Sampson Illustrator: Isabel Bush Mack Release Date: January 31, 2021 [eBook #64430] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 Produced by: Mary Glenn Krause, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Library of Congress) *** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JOSIE O'GORMAN AND THE MEDDLESOME MAJOR *** Josie O’Gorman and the Meddlesome Major The package tore and disclosed a mass of filmy lace.—Chapter VII Josie O’Gorman and the Meddlesome Major By Edith Van Dyne Author of The Mary Louise Stories, and Josie O’Gorman Frontispiece by Isabel Bush Mack The Reilly & Lee Co. Chicago Printed in the United States of America Copyright, 1924 by The Reilly & Lee Co. All Rights Reserved Josie O’Gorman and the Meddlesome Major CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I Josie Becomes a Sales Girl 7 II The New Home on Meadow Street 19 III The Neighbors in Apartment 3 31 IV Josie’s Little Black Book 44 V The Major Takes Up a Trail 54 VI Too Many Detectives 67 VII The Meddlesome Major Calls 79 VIII Mary Keeps the Faith 87 IX Who Is Miss Fauntleroy? 98 X “The Watermelons Have Come” 109 XI Mrs. Leslie Won to the Cause 118 XII A Boarding House Hero 129 XIII Jimmy Blaine Gets a Scoop 141 XIV The Quarrel Next Door 151 XV Josie Sets a Trap 160 XVI Mrs. Leslie Turns Detective 171 XVII The Girl in the Red Tam 182 XVIII Josie O’Gorman’s Victory 191 Josie and the Meddlesome Major CHAPTER I JOSIE BECOMES A SALES GIRL “Not much on looks!” “Who?” “That new girl the boss has just hired. Got no style to speak of. I reckon they’ll begin her at the notion counter. It don’t take much looks to hold down a job there.” “Brains, perhaps!” suggested a trim looking girl with twinkling grey eyes and wavy brown hair, noticeable in that it was not so elaborately coiffured as her companions’. “My opinion is, Gertie Wheelan, that Mr. Burnett thinks more about brains than beauty where his business is concerned.” “Don’t you fool yourself, Jane Morton. He may hire a plain one now and then because the good lookers give out, but take it from me, there ain’t a man livin’ that don’t fall for beauty.” “Well, since you are already so pretty, Gertie, suppose you give us folks that run to brains a chance to doll up a bit. You’ve been standing in front of that looking glass for ten minutes and lunch hour’s most up,” said a stylish little black- eyed girl who might have laid claim to beauty as well as wit. “Stop shoving me, Min,” begged Gertie. “Here, get in front of me. I can see over your head, you are such a little thing.” “I’m young yet,” snapped back Min. “By the time I am as old as you are I may grow some.” Age was Gertie’s tender point and Min’s sally drew a delighted laugh from the girls assembled in the employees’ room of the department store of Burnett & Burnett. While they were talking and laughing and primping a young girl quietly entered the room, so quietly that she had removed her hat and wrap and put them away in the locker room before the group around the mirror was even aware of her presence. It was the new girl and Gertie Wheelen was right—she was not much on looks, even less than that according to the standards of the employees of Burnett & Burnett. She was small, sandy haired, and her features, while not displeasing, were without distinction; eyes pale blue and nose more or less shapeless. Her mouth showed character and her teeth were white and even. Her complexion was good, being clear and healthy with a sprinkling of freckles over the formless nose. Gertie was wrong about the lack of style. Josie O’Gorman, while not modish, had style; a style that was all her own. She managed by arrangement of hair and cut of gown to look enough like other persons to pass unnoticed in a crowd, and yet Josie’s dress changed but little with the passing fashions and her intimate friends declared that the only alteration of hair dressing she ever indulged in was to show her ears or not show her ears according to the latest decree of fashion. Her dress was always immaculate and always the same—in the winter, blue serge with white collars and cuffs for the day, and white canton crepe trimmed with lace for evening; in the summer blue linen took the place of the blue serge and the canton crepe gave way to white linen or organdy. Her immaculate state was due to the fact that she had many gowns of the same model and innumerable collars and cuffs which she always laundered herself. “That’s her now,” said Gertie as she caught a glimpse of the new girl in the mirror over Min’s head. “She!” corrected Jane Morton. “The last lecture on salesmanship laid especial stress on the importance of good English.” Josie bowed politely and smiled pleasantly but impersonally at the girls. “How do you do?” said Jane. “I hope you will like Burnett & Burnett’s. It is really a great place to work. I want to introduce you to the girls.” “Glad to meet all of you—my name’s Josie O’Gorman.” “Where are you to begin?” asked Gertie. “Tapes, darning cotton and the like.” “What did I tell you?” Gertie whispered audibly to Min. “It is a good counter,” said Min. “It’s in the middle of the store where you can see everything that goes on. I tell you a lot is going on here lately—more ‘kleps’ have been busy. I’ve been working for Burnett & Burnett ever since I was a kid and I know they have lost more in the last month than they have since I was a cash girl. Seems like things just vanish. It certainly made me hot when that box of point lace just disappeared off the face of the earth. I wish Mr. Burnett would take me away from the lace counter and put me over with the safety pins. Nobody ever bothers to steal safety pins from a shop but just borrows them from friends.” [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] Josie laughed and decided she was going to like little Min and Jane Morton. “Do you think somebody stole the whole box of point lace?” Josie asked. “No I don’t think it—I know it. One minute it was there and the next minute it wasn’t there. I reported it the second that I missed it and Major Simpson, the detective, got busy right off but it was remnant day and the store was packed and jammed with bargain hunters and that lace was gone and gone for good. I sure did feel bad about it. I had to go up to the office and answer a million questions and before they got through with me I felt like I had swallowed the stuff and it was choking me. There was about five hundred dollars worth of lace in that box.” “Well how’d you like to be me and have some woman walk off with a whole bottle of perfume at ten dollars an ounce?” asked Gertie. “Old Burnett was sniffin’ around me so any body’d a thought I’d taken a bath in the stuff. I just howled and cried to beat the band. I made so much racket it took six floor walkers and the boss to pacify me and they finally sent me home in a taxi. I reckon the next time a thief gets busy at the toilet goods counter they won’t call on me to testify.” “Your tears cost ten dollars an ounce, do they?” laughed Josie. “Exactly!” “I fawncy the thief is someone from the outside,” drawled a girl who had hitherto been silent and who had been introduced to Josie as Miss Fauntleroy either because Jane Morton did not know her first name or did not care to use it. Miss Fauntleroy was a very striking looking young woman, tall, slender, and broad shouldered; a decided brunette with wonderfully arched brows and lashes long enough to marcel, at least so her co-workers at Burnett & Burnett’s declared. Her blue-black hair was done after the latest mode, with waves and puffs and ringlets galore and never a lock out of place even after the strenuous ordeal of bargain day. Her voice was a deep contralto with a slightly foreign intonation, although she had divulged to Min that she was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, and intimated that she had cultivated the drawl and accent because she considered it elegant. Of course Min had handed this information on to her best friends and it had become common property at the department store that Miss Fauntleroy was not near so mysterious as she would have one think. Her hands and feet were large but her shoes were stylishly cut and her nails showed much care and attention. She walked with a slow swinging gait and seemed never to be in a hurry, even when closing hour was approaching. She had proven herself an efficient saleswoman in the jewel and novelty department. Josie O’Gorman’s ostensible business at Burnett & Burnett’s was the selling of tapes and darning cotton, and so ably did she play the part of shop girl that no one but her employers dreamed she was there for any other purpose. There was nothing in the girl’s appearance to indicate that she was the cleverest detective of her age and sex in the United States. Shoplifting had developed into a serious matter in the department store of Burnett & Burnett, so serious that they had found it necessary to call in outside help on their detective force. Up to this time the detective force had been more or less of a farce since it was what the younger member of the firm, Mr. Theodore Burnett, designated as an inherited failing, one handed down from father to son to grandsons. The “force” consisted of one old gentleman known as Major Simpson. “I’m not saying poor old Simpson is not a good man, as good as they make them,” Mr. Theodore Burnett said to Josie when she reported to the firm in regard to entering their employ. “Good man but poor detective,” put in the elder brother, Mr. Charles Burnett. “See here, Miss O’Gorman, we’ve got you over here from Dorfield because Captain Lonsdale has recommended you so highly. I fancy there are detectives right here in our own city of Wakely that could do the business for us but you understand we don’t want poor old Simpson to know we are employing outside help. He is very touchy—” “And very conceited!” interrupted Mr. Theodore. “Be that as it may, we don’t want to hurt his feelings as he has been with the firm from the beginning. My grandfather stated in his will that Major Simpson should have a job with us as long as he wanted it and after that was to be pensioned.” “But the old duck refuses to be pensioned although we offered to pay him more for not working than for working,” laughed Mr. Theodore. “I rather like that in him,” said Josie. “But now to come down to what you want me to do. As I understand it I am to be employed by you secretly and you are to turn me loose, giving me carte blanche as to my methods.” “Ahem!” hesitated Mr. Charles, who had his own idea about how everything connected with the department store should be run. “N-n-ot exactly.” “Of course you are to work it your own way,” put in Theodore. “My brother just means he’d take it as a favor if you report to us now and then.” “Naturally! Well then, in the first place perhaps I had better have another name to start with as somebody may know my true name. Not because of my own reputation as a detective—I have none to speak of—but because of my father’s. Perhaps you are aware of the fact that my father was one of the most able detectives in America, and that means the world, because we are up with the French and ahead of the Russians in the detective business.” [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] The Burnetts did not know it but they had the tact to pretend they did, so Josie’s one tender point was spared a jab. Mary Smith was agreed upon as a good working name and the notion counter as a fair vantage point from which to view the comings and goings of possible shoplifters. “I should like a list of the names and addresses of all your employees,” suggested Josie. “Certainly, Miss O’Gorman,” agreed the brothers. “Smith! Just forget my name is O’Gorman, please.” “Oh, sure! Miss Smith!” At this juncture there came a light knock on the door and without waiting for permission a dapper little old gentleman entered the private office of the president. Josie decided that the new comer was as pompous in the back as he was in the front and when he seated himself stiffly in a high backed chair she came to the conclusion that he had achieved something which she had hitherto considered impossible—for a person to be as pompous sitting down as standing up. Evidently there was no doubt in the old gentleman’s mind that he was a more important personage than either the president or vice-president of Burnett & Burnett’s. As for the little sandy haired shop girl, who was no doubt being employed by the firm—she was of no importance whatsoever. “I wish to speak with you alone, Mr. Charles. Of course Mr. Theodore may remain if he so desires, but—” he looked meaningly at Josie, “others may retire. New girl, I presume.” “Yes—let me introduce you to Miss O’Gorman, Major Simpson,” said the senior member of the firm. “Smith,” hastily corrected the junior member. Major Simpson did not hear the correction and Josie was registered on the tablets of the old gentleman’s memory as O’Gorman and O’Gorman she was forced to remain, since it was deemed wiser not to take the present incumbent of house detective into their confidence and being introduced by one name and employed by another would certainly have caused suspicion. “I am sorry Brother Charles made the break,” Theodore said as he accompanied Josie to the elevator, leaving his brother alone with Major Simpson. “Oh, that’s all right,” laughed Josie. “I’m not much on aliases anyhow and really prefer working in my own name. Please let me have the list of employees and their addresses as soon as possible.” [17] [18] CHAPTER II THE NEW HOME ON MEADOW STREET Wakely classed itself as a city, while Dorfield was content to be listed as a mere town that might someday grow up. In spite of its size, Wakely seemed to our young detective to be a very lonesome place on that first Sunday she was compelled to spend away from all her dear friends in Dorfield, where she had lived since her father’s death. There were plenty of people in Wakely, too many people, in fact, making the housing problem a serious one. But nobody knew Josie and nobody cared to know her. Nobody paid the least attention to her at the beautiful old church where she had gone to worship in the morning; nobody spoke to her at the clean little restaurant where she had eaten her Sunday dinner; and now as she sat on a bench in the city park, nobody in all the surging throngs out for the usual Sunday stroll even so much as glanced her way. Josie was not inclined to be lonesome. She was too interested in people and things to think very much of her own aloneness, but there were times when in spite of herself she felt a crying need for a real home of her own; something more than the partitioned off rear end of a shop, which was where she had been living for some time before coming to Wakely. The place was called The Higgledy Piggledy Shop, conducted by Josie and her friends Elizabeth Wright and Irene Mae Farlane, and they had managed it to their profit and to the delectation of the citizens of Dorfield, who found in it a long felt want. If the Higgledy Piggledies did not have what you wanted they would get it for you, and if they could not do what you wished done they would see to it that someone else did do it. For Josie the shop was in reality a side line of the detective business, but it was of great interest to her and she missed the gay chatter of the partners, the daily visits of her dear Mary Louise—young Mrs. Danny Dexter—and she sorely missed the kindly interest and advice of Captain Charlie Lonsdale, the Chief of Police of Dorfield. He it was who had so highly recommended Josie to Burnett & Burnett. “I almost wish he hadn’t,” sighed Josie as she sat on the park bench in the wintry sunshine and watched the people of Wakely swarm past. “I don’t care much who steals the stupid old dry-goods. It’s a dull job and I’d be glad to be out of it.” “Hello! There’s somebody I know—but who on earth is it? Where have I seen that boy before? Certainly I don’t remember ever having laid eyes on his companions, rare birds that they are!” Many persons pride themselves on never forgetting a face, but Josie might have patted herself on the back for never forgetting a pair of shoulders, a set of head, a contour of cheek or chin. However, she was completely baffled by the youth who had passed her as she sat on the hard, cold bench. Our little detective was irritated that she could not remember where she had seen that turn of cheek and line of shoulder, so irritated that she decided the seat in the park was very uncomfortable and she would trail along behind the trio and find out something about them. Her curiosity was idle but was it not Sunday afternoon? Why not let curiosity be idle as well as persons? The man and woman walking with the youth appeared too young to be the father and mother of the boy and too old to be brother and sister, yet there was an intangible resemblance to both that led Josie to conclude they were his parents. The man was swarthy, black-eyed, and flashily dressed in a checked suit, gray spats and a brown derby. He walked with a slight swagger, twirling a slender cane in his lemon colored gloved hand. The woman was small, inclined to be stout, and a great mop of henna colored hair elaborately dressed in waves and puffs defied oversight and invited scrutiny. She wore a handsome fur cloak and a purple velvet hat. Her cheeks and lips were tinted a bright coral and her nose was powdered like a marshmallow. In spite of the paint and powder there was something youthful and attractive about the woman. She walked with a light step and had a gay bird-like manner. The younger man, or boy—he looked about eighteen, Josie decided—had an elegance that his companions lacked, although they would have been greatly astonished had they been told that the quiet unimportant little person, whom they had passed in the park and who later had passed them on the sidewalk, considered them anything but the last cry of elegance and fashion. Josie was able to get a good look at the trio at a crossing. Undoubtedly the boy was the son of the bizarre couple. He had his father’s bold black eyes and his mother’s delicate tilted nose and softly rounded cheek. “Where—where have I seen him before?” Josie asked herself. “Never mind, I’ll remember someday. In the mean time I think I’ll find out where they live—not that it is any of my business—but one never can tell when information will come in handy in this business of detecting criminals. Anyhow I don’t trust those two, although I reckon the boy is all right. He looks too young to be anything else but all right and he looks honest, at least he looks honest in contrast to his father. My opinion is that the old one is in checks now but has been in stripes, or should have been. I wonder what they do. People, I’ll bet anything, and they do them brown while they are about it.” Josie stopped to look in a window in order to let the trio get ahead of her and then nonchalantly followed them at a safe distance. They talked animatedly and their gestures were decidedly foreign-like in their swift and jerky repetition. It was impossible for Josie to catch what they were saying without seeming too interested in them, but it was easy to see that both man and woman were endeavoring to pacify the youth and persuade him to do something to which he was opposed. Once he stopped short on the sidewalk and Josie came within earshot as the boy said in a tone of suppressed violence: “I tell you I’m sick of the whole game. I’m going to quit!” [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] “Oh, Roy, darling, not just now,” purred the woman, and Josie noted that the R in Roy and darling was softly rolled, giving a slightly foreign accent. “Not now when—” but the woman whispered the rest and the listener could not hear what was the big reason for not quitting just yet, nor could she gather what the game was that Roy wanted to quit. The man said nothing, merely stood gnawing his moustache in a manner highly melodramatic and cut the air viciously with his slender cane. Josie loitered after them, wondering what part of the city they lived in, what they did for a living, and in the back of her brain was always the question: “Where have I seen the boy before?” Josie was stopping for the time being at a hotel, though she realized it would never do for it to be known that a shop girl was living so extravagantly. Early in life Josie O’Gorman had learned from her illustrious father that in the detective business no detail was too small to be overlooked. If one was supposed to be a shop girl then one must live, eat, dress, act and talk like a shop girl. After three days at Burnett & Burnett’s Josie had come to the conclusion that shop girls were like any other wage earning girls, some silly, some clever; some educated, some ignorant; some inclined to put all their earnings on their backs, some saving up for a rainy day; but none of them were able to live in hotels. So, to play the part, she must bestir herself and find other quarters. The firm was paying her handsomely for her time and she could well afford to keep her comfortable room and bath. She was tempted to do it and give a false address if any of the girls should ask her where she lived but she remembered one of her father’s favorite sayings: “Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practice to deceive.” This old saying had decided the matter for her and on that Sunday afternoon she had armed herself with clippings from the “Boarders Wanted” column in the morning paper and was determined to go the rounds and settle herself as soon as possible. The trio she was following turned the corner. Josie turned after them. Glancing at the street sign she read that she was on Meadow Street. Several of the ads were on Meadow Street. She ran quickly through them. The man, woman and youth went in at No. 11. It was a shabby, drab looking apartment house. Yes, there was a room for rent in that very house—“Widow and daughter wish to rent room to young business woman. 11 East Meadow, apartment 4.” Josie had liked the ad from the beginning. “They don’t flaunt their own refinement in their ad and they say business woman instead of business lady. They delicately inform the public that there is no brute of a husband around. On the whole I believe I’ll rent a room at 11 East Meadow. I can keep my eye on those flashy folk if I do. I suppose it’s none of my business—but one never can tell.” Josie noticed that the interesting trio went in the house without ringing one of the bells displayed in the lobby. “That means they either live here or are intimate with someone who does,” was her conclusion. Apartment 4 proved to be one of the back ones on the lower floor. The family who had so interested Josie had entered the one marked 3. After ringing the bell of No. 4, Josie had peered into the dark hall and had plainly seen the fur coat of the henna haired woman disappear through the door after the man in the checked suit had opened it with a latch key. “That settles me,” thought Josie. “I’ll take this room if the widow and her daughter turn out to be most undesirable landladies in Wakely.” Fortunately they turned out to be pleasant folk who had seen better days, to which the refinement and taste in the furnishings of their living room gave mute evidence. The tiny bedroom advertised for rent suited Josie perfectly; suited also the part she must play as a new shop girl at Burnett & Burnett’s with but little money to spend on sleeping quarters. Mrs. Leslie did hemstitching and fine embroidery to eke out the salary her daughter made as a stenographer. The home was neat, and while Josie’s room had only one very small window, it did not open on a court but had a view of a small back yard which Mrs. Leslie informed her would later prove a great pleasure to them all. “It is really quite sweet, and the janitor says that in the spring we may plant all the seeds there we want to. Mary and I will be much happier if we have a place where we can dig. We never quite get over longing for the country.” Everything being satisfactory, Josie moved in that very evening, the question of references being waived because Mrs. Leslie had a feeling when she looked in Josie’s honest face that she was going to like her; and since one of the trusted employees of Burnett & Burnett’s came from her county that fact was enough to guarantee the goodness of any one of his fellow employees. “We are sorry not to give you your meals,” said Mrs. Leslie, “but Mary and I live so simply.” “You couldn’t live too simply for me,” declared Josie, “but I wouldn’t be any trouble to you for worlds. I can easily get my meals at one of the many restaurants near here.” “Oh Mother, couldn’t we?” asked Mary. “Anyhow just breakfast—” and Mrs. Leslie decided they could manage breakfast and dinner too. So Josie was installed as a lodger and boarder and soon the lonesome feeling departed as she began to think that perhaps Wakely was not such a dismally lonely city after all. The Leslies were a gentle, pleasant, kindly pair, and Josie was sorely tempted to tell them all about herself; how she happened to be in Wakely and what her real profession was. But she remembered in time what her father used to say, holding up a forefinger in impressive fashion: “You know and I know and that makes eleven.” [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] So Josie held her tongue. She was such an “eloquent listener” that persons were inclined to tell her all about themselves and to forget to ask for the story of her life. The Leslies were like most others and found themselves chatting away to their new lodger with little or no restraint. She found out they were strangers in Wakely, having lived there only two months, knowing very few people in the town and none of the fellow tenants. “We don’t even know the people who live right next to us,” said Mary. “Mother says she is glad we don’t but I must confess I’d rather like to know the boy. He is so handsome and kind of sad looking. I can’t say much for the sister, though. She is handsome enough but at times a little coarse and rough. The boy is at home only on Saturday afternoons and Sunday. I have an idea he and his sister are not on very good terms. I have never yet seen them go anywhere together. I can’t see why, because if I had a brother I’d be tagging on after him all the time.” “Especially if he were such a good looking brother as you say this young man next door is,” laughed Josie. [30] CHAPTER III THE NEIGHBORS IN APARTMENT 3 Josie reported for work bright and early Monday morning, so early that she was able to have a private interview with Mr. Theodore Burnett before the business of selling notions was booked to begin. He had the list of employees and their addresses all neatly typed, also in what department of the store each one worked. “I may not be able to keep up the farce of selling notions for very long,” Josie explained to him. “You may have to pretend to suspend me or something so I can have time to be a detective but I’d like to hang on there for a few days so I can get the run of things.” “Suit yourself, young lady! We are in your hands. By the way, old Major Simpson was rather curious about you. I do not understand why he wanted to know so much about you.” “I don’t either. Perhaps he met my father in days gone by.” Whatever the reason, Josie could but notice that the pompous old detective spent a great deal of time hanging around the notion counter. He seemed to be vastly interested in what she was doing and was constantly bumping into her whenever she left her department. She even fancied he dogged her footsteps when she went out to lunch, and was sure that he followed her all the way home. “It can’t be my beauty that is attracting him, because there is no such thing; and it can’t be my wit, for he has not heard me say a word. It must be that I look like my father and somewhere in his profession as detective he met my father.” It was a well known fact that Detective O’Gorman had been one of the homeliest men in the service, but such was his little daughter’s admiration for him that she never could get a compliment that pleased her so much as for someone to say she resembled him in the slightest degree. “Old Major Simpson would have been a joke to him, but there may be some intelligence in the old fellow after all. There certainly is if he admired my father.” So thought Josie as she walked through the streets of Wakely, conscious that a bombastic old gentleman was dogging her footsteps. In her work of selling notions she was sure that never a paper of pins was sold by her without the house detective’s knowledge. At first it irritated her, but in the end she found it an amusing game to elude his watchful eye. By carefully studying the list of employees she soon was able to fit name to face over the whole store and place each person in his or her proper department. Then came the job of finding the address of each employee. “It seems to me important to know if any of them are living beyond their means,” she explained to Mr. Theodore when he asked her why she went to work in such a systematic manner. “When persons begin to do that, then it’s time to look out. They have a motive for getting-rich-quick, and sometimes when there is a motive the action follows fast.” Poor old Major Simpson had a hard time keeping up with Josie. Every evening after the store was closed the girl made it her business to check off a certain number of fellow workers, quietly rounding up their homes, sometimes walking with them under a pretext of having business in their neighborhoods, sometimes merely following them. The panting and puffing detective lost the scent continually, and then Josie felt sorry for him and made it easier for him the next time. Gradually she made friends with the employees, careful always to be the listener and for that reason universally popular. So completely did she efface herself when she happened to make one of a crowd that the girls would actually forget her presence. Miss Fauntleroy, the tall handsome girl at the jewel counter, was one person to whom Josie found it difficult to make up. She had a cold manner and attended strictly to business. The address given on the list was a suburban one, 10 Linden Row, Linden Heights, and Josie was forced to put off looking into her surroundings until the winter weather abated somewhat in its ferocity. “Not that I mind the weather,” she said to herself, “but it would be too bad to take the old Major out where there are no paved streets while snow is up to one’s knees. He might catch his death.” There was a let up in the shoplifting, no trouble having occurred since Josie entered the employ of Burnett & Burnett. She had been with them two weeks and except for the fact that she proved to be an able saleswoman of notions, she had accomplished nothing. “You had better dismiss me and let me go back home,” she said to Mr. Theodore. “You certainly have no need of me here, and the Higgledy Piggledy Shop is missing me sorely.” “Not at all!” declared the junior member of the firm. “We have plenty of need of you. It may be that there is no shoplifting because the thief is afraid of you.” “But how could he know I was here?” “Perhaps others know of the fame of your father as well as old Simpson.” “Perhaps—but after all I am not supposed to be so much a watchdog as a blood hound. If detectives were simply preventives they would lose all their cunning and skill from disuse. I am sure you could find a cheaper watchdog than I am.” “Well, we are not kicking about the price so why need you?” [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] Josie had had many interviews with the members of the firm and felt they were her friends and respected her. She especially liked Mr. Theodore, who seemed somewhat more progressive than his brother, but both of them were kindly and courteous. Mr. Theodore, who was an old bachelor, had invited Josie to dine with his family; insisting that his mother and sisters would come and call on her and that they would be delighted to make her acquaintance, but Josie had firmly refused. “Not while I am selling notions,” she had laughed. “It would leak out in the store somehow and then someone would suspect immediately that I was not what I seem to be. Major Simpson is already worried about me and my job. I’ll wager he is standing outside of this door right now and his moustache and goatee are both bristling with curiosity concerning what the business is that brings me to your private office before opening hours. He would have his ear at the key hole if he dared and if his sense of dignity didn’t forbid. Why don’t you take him into your confidence? It doesn’t seem quite fair somehow.” “Fair enough! If he wasn’t so conceited we might have you work with him but he is so cock sure of his own ability. I give you my word, Miss O’Gorman, he has never yet landed a shoplifter. Sometimes they have been caught by clerks or floor walkers, but old Simpson can’t see beyond his own embonpoint. Of course if you want his help—” “Heavens, no!” laughed Josie, “but I should like to know what he knows about me and my being here, and why he doesn’t come out and say so if he does know who I am. Is he at all peeved with you and Mr. Burnett, your brother?” “Not at all. In fact, he seems especially delighted with us as well as himself. I can always tell when he is pleased by the way he smiles on me and strokes his goatee.” Three weeks had passed and Josie felt she was not earning her salt. Carefully she watched the lower floor of the store from the vantage ground of the notion counter. Two bargain Fridays had come and gone and as far as Burnett & Burnett could tell not one single person had left their emporium without either paying or promising to pay for the goods carried off. The evenings with the Leslies were quiet and peaceful. The neighbors at No. 3 left early and returned late. Josie occasionally caught a glimpse of the man and his wife but she had not seen the girl. The youth, she had encountered twice in the street and still his appearance puzzled her. She was more certain than ever that she had seen him before, but where? “I believe they are kind and charitable, anyhow,” said Mary. “I met a terrible looking old beggar in the hall coming from their apartment and I am sure they had given him something because the lady spoke to him in such a gentle tone and he answered her gently and—” “What did they say?” asked Josie. “I couldn’t make out, but it sounded kind of foreign. That made me think maybe the woman has found out there is someone of her nationality here in Wakely and she is kind to him because he is from her own country.” Mary was the type that always made the best of everything and everybody. “Well, for my part, I think it is a great mistake to encourage tramps and beggars,” said Mrs. Leslie. “Now in the country we never could do it. If we even so much as fed one tramp we had a swarm of them coming to us for years. My husband once gave one an old suit of clothes and some shoes and after I had fed him Mr. Leslie told him he could spend the night in the barn because it was coming up to snow. After that a week never passed that some disreputable old bum didn’t come whining to my back door. It kept up until we had the road gate painted, posts and all, and then they let up on us and we began to think that the first one had put the tramp’s mark on our gate and all the others read it and knew we were kind hearted. Of course the paint destroyed the mark.” “What a wonderful mark to have on your gate!” exclaimed Mary. “I wish I knew what it was and could put one on our door.” “Perhaps one is there,” suggested Josie, “and I saw it and ventured in.” “I don’t want any real tramps around here,” insisted Mrs. Leslie. “You, Josie, are less like a tramp than any one I ever saw. I felt safe with you from the moment you entered the door and I never have felt safe with any tramp. I don’t like to think that tramps might be coming in and out of this house and if I ever see or hear of another one being in the hall I am going to complain to the landlord.” “Oh, Mother, please don’t! What would our neighbors think of us?” “It makes mighty little difference what they think. People who don’t speak our language and have tramps calling on them have no business thinking.” Josie laughed. Mrs. Leslie’s feeling in regard to tramps and foreigners was a common one with persons born and raised in the country. They encouraged neither tramping nor immigration. “We have two beggars at Burnett & Burnett’s,” said Josie, “one at the front entrance and one at the back. It is against my principles to give to street beggars but I have a hard time getting by those two. The Associated Charities are constantly asking the public not to encourage beggars but send them to the A. C. so that they can look into their cases. I am sure they are right, and good citizens should uphold them; but beggars such as we have at our front and back entrances seem to be able to appeal against reason and I am sure they reap a substantial harvest. When charitable ladies get up tag days for their pet concerns they should man the stations with just such beggars instead of attractive [36] [37] [38] [39] [40]