Evening Star Newspaper, September 6, 1925, Page 50

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, SEPTEMBER 6, 1925— PART THE GIRL WITH THE PAY ROLL Hlustrated by HAROLD LUND HEY met of a met, that is, in the sense that fate forced her to hold con verse with him. Other times when they might have met they had passed without speaking she—Ann Sylvester—at a decorous and restrained 20 miles an hour, look ing as if butter would melt neither in | her pretty mouth nor on the radiator the little tin coupe she drove; he chard Duer—at his customary cocky 0 one could rebuke Dickey Duer for driving 35. Or even 65. But he, if.he chose, could rebuke Ann. This was because Dicky was a_mem ber of the Massachusetts State Patrol Ann detested him. Long before she even saw him—officially. The corners feminine eyes are ever so service able. As for Dicky he had, as both a State patrolman and a private citizen, a roving eve. The latter had noted Ann as both a patrolman and an individual ‘Easy to look at.” the individual had decided. “And quite aware of it Ann usually heard him long before she saw him This particular June evening, how ever, Dicky and his motor cycle were neither to be seen nor heard. Both it and Dicky were in ambush off the State road. He was smoking a sur- reptitious cigarette. Chis was a viola ion of the rule number something or other and Dickey jolly well knew it Ile remained unperturhed. The quality of the night have maintained, was excuse enough for his dereliction. It was a June night, but not the sort of a June night that poets customarily celebrate. It raining. Dicky could 't ignor And I left my happy home for * he murmured. A . he wasn't sorry He had known what he was up st when he became a State pa 1. His father had put the cas VERTH Nt June evening. | plied sternly he would | | to thdt before him and his father was trained | n the presentation of facts, being an able and well compensated corporation lawye, “And.” Di rated, “ther never been particularly discipline, you know, Richard."” “Probably just what I need had retorted cheerfully The point was that he didn’t want to be a corporation lawyer. Not vet, anyway. And he did want to join the State patrol This his father could not understand when Dicky broke the news to him. Later he did, The Massachusetts State Patrol, he discovered, was made up of les than 150 young D'Artagnans, picked in every sense of the word. His motive in investiga being misconstrued, he had been warned that the waiting list_was prodigious and that neither political pull nor social prestige could secure preferment for Dicky “But I want to keep him out! had protested The man he had questioned ven him swift, curious glance. T don't think you need worry about that,” he had commented dryly ‘'Oh, is that so!" retorted Dicky's father—to himself. To Dicky, he had said, “I'm not sure you can get in, but if you can—" “Oh, I'm in," Dicky had replied blithely. next week. In three months I'll dead—or I'll have my shield.” At the end of the three months’ training he was, on his own, author- ity, near dead but he had his shield. Officially he was State Patrolman Richard Curtis Duer. Otherwise, he was still Dicky—Dicky lurking in am- bush this drenched June dusk, smok- ing a forbldden cigarette. * % % ¥ FEW cars were abroad. It was a night to stay at home. Indeed, Ann’s mother had so suggested. “I'll be more careful tonight,” Ann promised. “Don’t worry, mother. Ann’s mother had retorted that she would worry. But Ann had gone, leaving her mother to find what solace she might in the perusal of the paper. This had proved short-lived. *Friday the thirteenth!” she gasped as she noted the date line. “Oh dear—and such a night! She's so reckles No one privileged to.view Ann's ac tivities at that instant would have doubted that. Dicky was so privi leged. Of course, Ann did not know that. She belleved she had found hat she sought—a stretch of yeasty road with not a car in sight. And so she firmly—if fearfully—placed her foot on the service brake. s father had the discipline. pero Dicky he be The surreptitious cigarette he was | consuming Dicky’s lips. He stopped short. The little tin coupe having spun about like a der- vish was now headed back in the di- rection from which it had come. Ann caught her breath and stepped on the gas. Dicky spun his engine. This was a matter for investigation. Ann, for once, failed to hear him. “1 did it,” she wa iring herself, dizzy with skidding and triumph. went around twice, but T did it T'll bet I could do it again. As she slammed her bra he car did just what she expected— ut the last thing Dicky was expect- 5. Its rear wheels just shaved his front wheel. A hundredth of a second later Ann saw him hurtle by. He was not_trying to skid The little coupe, as if to deny all complicity in the matter, promptly stalled and looked the picture of perfect innocence. This Ann could not achieve. Her headlights revealed Dicky with his motor sycle under con- rol but minus his cap and, she sus. pected, his temper, bearing down on her. = “Well,” I was Ann, “I'll tell the world you succeeded,” he replied grimly. ‘“Are you often taken that way?” “Only when the road is wet,” she retorted. “It can't be done when the road {s dry, can it?” “It .can,” he replied. “How Dicky gave her a suspicious glance. “You skid enough as it is,” he re- all but dropped from And he demanded irately. trying to skid,” confessed had | “Start preliminary training | You've | amenable to | | Violet | on any The protection of his pay roll | i | | get. sl again { tively, known a | Dope ‘and the | business |idea_with a black-jack roads!” ot safe?’ “I'd like to see | skid.” In spite of himself Dicky grinned. —nearly did!” he reminded her. So—I saw."” “I ought to put you into court,” he assured her, relapsing into his official manner. “But I'll let yi time. Only don't let me again."” “I'll certainly try not to,” she replied with a meekness that but masked mocker she echoed indignantly. you make a = cateh you * FI’HR_\L'\I K. SMITH was president * of the Smith Shoe Company, Linford, Mass. Ann called herself his private secre- tary. He called her his stenographer. As such he paid her $25 a week. He himself had married on Jess, as he had reminded her—until it occurred to her to ask what round steak and anything else he might mention, including shoes, had cost then. Old Eph had merely grunted. But in had chuckled ““Pretty—but smart as a whip, his opinion of Ann. Ann had told everybody she buying the coupe on instaliments. She had not told anybody that old Eph was paying these installments. This was deceitful. Also discreet. For when a man who is past 60, who has a wife. a_married daughter and grandchildren suggests to his stenographer, who is neither married nor 66, that he will present her with a car under n conditions, a sus. picious world expected to prick up its ears. Especially when the man has the reputation of being a tight wad Even coupe Ann’s had not asm. It was needed paint first, glimpse of the damped her enthusi second-hand and it But “Come and see it now, mother,” she had called when she had attacked it with paint and brush. “Doesn’t it look dandy? Couldn’t you just hug it “You mother Paint there, nated if you her ired her. on her nose, Ann had stood gazing raptly at the rejuve. coupe. “I guess I'll call it he had decided In Boston on that same Friday the thirteenth when Ann and Violet skid- ded into Dicky's life. if not his heart, three men were holding what business men call a conference. They were variously, and more or less descrip Lefty Red, Loule the Chelsea Cyclone. The they were discussing con: cerned Old Eph's pay roll had,” From the time he had started out | for himself, back in the 80s, Oid Eph had carried his weekly pay roll from the bank every Saturday morn- ing. He had seen no reason why he shouldn’t. He had read of pay roll robberies, but he had an idea that he was immune. Many so-called hard- headed business men have ideas like that. Even the hardest cannot resist head, however, the impact of a ne hind it. The black-jack had struck Old Eph back in April. - When he came too, the leather bag and its contents were gone. "THE prevalling opinon was that 0ld ph would recover from the blow on his head but he never would get over the blow his bankroll had sus tained. And, in fact, it was the loss of his pay roll that Old Eph had minded most. New skin would grow on his head, but $16,000 didn't grow bush he had ever met up o T with. became a mania with him. Even so he wasn't, as he as his wife, crazy enough to pay rate the insurance companies quoted him. So Linford had gasped when, ured Old Eph with bandaged head walked from the First—and only—National Bank of Linford carrying the new leather bag which replaced the old one. The only apparent departure from his_former practice was that now the Linford police force accom- panied him in full uniform The police force’s name was Chief, He had other mames, but these had been submerged beneath his title. He was an institution, like the fat men's race at the county fair. “Now what I plan to do,” Old Eph had explained to Ann, “is to have Eb Sears get the pay roll every Saturday | morning when he gets change for the day. It will be all ready for him wrapped up like an ordinary bundle. You get it with the other Stuff you need for the office at his store—you can order your supplies so there will be several bundles Saturday—and bring it along with you in the car with nobody the wiser. See?” Ann had said she did. But what she had seen was the car she was to ‘Il go to the bank and get what everybody thinks is the pay roll, but it will be only silver for change,” con tinued Old Eph. “That's the plan; what do you think of it? “I think it's too wonderful words,” she had replied. But she was thinking not of the plan but of the car. To get Violet she would have agreed to transport the crown jewels of England. And besides, as Old Eph had pointed out, there was no danger anyway, because nobody would ever suspect that she was carrying the pay roll. This to Ann had seem indisputable. How could any one suspect? No one in Linford had. The report that had come to the Chelsea Cy- clone’s caulifiower ears and put his bashed nose on scent was that Eph still carried the pay roll himself. This Lefty Red and Loule the Dope had doubted. “That guy’s been stung once and it don’t stand to reason he'd do a thing like that,” Lefty had said positively. “It ain't even worth investigating.” But Chelsea had decided otherwise. On the Saturday before—June 7, for better u off this the | Saturday after he had been robbed, | It Seems That There Is Romance Even in Skidding “You're not safe on the | ! private he | was | was | Ann had attended that is—he had visited Linford. He had seen Eb Sears emerge from the bank and cross the street. He had not been interested. Later he had into Eb Sears's shop. He was con scious of a certain tenseness in her manner of which she herself was un aware. But it was not until Violet had come to'a stop at the factory entrance, at the-other end of Main street, that an idea had struck him “The skirt’s got the coin,” he had | gasped. | ~ Ann.had seen Chelsea. She had had to pass within a few feet of him. And | he -was an awful looking ecreature to pass while carrying almost $16,000. But she had promptly forgotten him | untni— “I don’t know what the world is coming to,” her mother had remarked |when Ann had arrived home that | night | “They've held up | over in Eastboro and another pay roll.” *“Another pay roll had gasped. “It's in the paper—read it while I | set the table.” ANN had read jt. The thieves had driven into Eastboro in a touring car which had been parked in a side street. As the pay roli car appeared, | the touring car had swung across the an automobile got away with robbery?” Ann 3 A e the | road in front of it as if about to turn | |around. The driver of the pay roll “oar had, necessarily, slackened his pace. An armed guard sat beside him, his eves intent on the car ahead At that instant two men previously stationed at either side of the street | had jumped on the running board of | the pay roll car. One of these had | promptly shot the armed guard dead | The other had black-jacked the chauf- | feur. The street had been crowded | But before anybody could move, the bandits who had jumped the pay roll car had seized the pay roll, joined | their companions in the touring car and made their escape. Of the bandits no adequate descrip- | | tion had been obtained, but the police | were looking for a man who had been | observed around Eastboro the Satur- | day before, probably reconnaitering. To Ann there had come at that point the memory of a man with a |bashed nose and a cauliflower ear And he had been watching the bank | __Next door to Ann lived Tommy | Davis. Tommy was seventeen. He | had a flivver with a sport body on it | Now it was his proud boast he could kid his flivver 40 ways and bring it to a stop on a_ten-cent piece. Nevertheless, Tommy belleved that genius is a matter of daily practice. | When the conditions were not favor- | able for practice he made them so. | After he had the pavement weli soaked he produc made it do its daily dozen. teach him to skid!” Ann's mother had remarked grim: my needed no teaching. But she said nothing. To her mother, that is. To Tommy, as soon as her mother had withdrawn, she did address herself. | “Can you skid the car around—so | that it will be going in the opposite | direction?” she had demanded. Huh—that's A B C stuff. watch me!” Tommy had commanded. Ann had. Then, “Show 'me how to do it,” she had begged. “Want to break your neck?” Tom. my had suggested scornfully. But being - masculine he could not with- hold the information. “Of course,” he had added, “it takes some nerve —and a lot of practice.” Ann had refused to admit that she lacked the nerve. As for the practice, it had rained the following Monday | seen Ann and Violet appear and go | Just | | d‘ his flivver and | feminine contacts. “If Tommy was a son of mine I'd | was certainly thinking of Ann | { Ann might have retored that Tom- | terest |she thought, AnROLD LUNB THE BLACKJACK HAD STRU CK OLD EPH. WHH§ HE CAME TO, 'I"HELI:F.ATHER BAG Y'Ah GONE. and she had made a beginning. And s0 on Friday the 13th she had ventured forth again and displayed progress that should have won her commen- | diums from Dicky. But all he had| given her was a scolding and, unwit- tingly, a suggestion, which was that | one could skid on dry pavements. “But there was, of course, no chance to try that before another Saturday rolled around—the Saturday which brought Lefty to Linford to investi gate Chelsea’s hunct No one noticed Lefty. Least of all Ann. She was looking for somebody | else. This was not Dicky Duer, who passed her as she and Violet came down Main street Ann ignored Dicky “Is he on the job apprehensivels LEFTY had ' state patrolm: breathed passed out came back came to newsstand The watering sprinkled Main have skidded easily. Her e not to. she emerged from & newsstand and continued on_her way her spirits began The man with the bashed nose and caulifiower ear was nowhere to be seen | This convinced her that she had been imagining things. But Chelsea hadn't passed out of her life—yet. | That’s what 1 told you,” he was to remind Lefty. “The skirt's got it —just as I said. We could have nailed | it today if you had taken my word for it. “We'll have it next Saturday, way,” promised Lefty griml No one had asked the State patrol to protect Old Eph's pay roil. But the State patrol, like all police units, is an arm of that special Providence that is supposed to watch over fools. Bither | Dicky or one of his fellows was always | in the offing when Old Eph started his | Saturday morning pilgrimage. They | had no reason to believe that the pay roll was not in Old Eph's possession. This morning Old Eph had been Dick ignment. But Old Eph | never went to the hank untii 10, and{ at 9, when Ann passed through, Dicky | had felt privileged to turn his roving eye on her. | That bus of hers,” he had solilo- | quized, “‘certainly goes evervwhere she does. T w if she takes it to bed | with ‘he; | his implied fresh criticlsm. Actu- ally: Dicky was, in spite of his private | impressions of her mental capacity inclined to regard Ann favorably. A State patrolman in Massachusetts is on | call 24 hours a day, save for two days a month, which he has to himself. This does not leave much_ time for Perhaps Dicky was for these. Anyway, he Lefty did not. | he wondered | desire to patk when Then his just no cross a ile Dicky eyes Violet Ann n had could was usual, Ann cart, a street any- getting hungry Even he could not have told when or why personal and professional in. suddenly merged. But as he pictured Ann. something in him quick- ened suddenly to the memory of the suppressed excitement Ann had seemed to radiate that morning. The same quality that the Chelsea Cyclone and Lefty had marked and interpreted. Now Dicky came to the conclusion with a bang. “I'll bet my shield she’s carrying the pay roll,” he assured him- self. “If that's it, she's sure one game kid None of the increased respect for Ann this implied was to be marked in his manner the next time he passed her, however. This was the follow- ing Monday. As their eyes met she| saw in his that which left her zled. It was as if they said: what T know about you!” * k Xk % F course Ann couldn’t understand that. “He's the freshest thing! indignantly, and invol- untarily expressed her righteous an- ger by stepping on the gas until Vio- let was_traveling at a prohibited 83.| This Dicky took official cognizance of, starting in pursuit. Ann heard him coming and checked her pace, but he stopped her just the same. “‘No person,’” he quoted, ‘may op- | erate a motor vehicle in Massachu- | Setts at a speed greater than is rea- sonable and proper, and faster than 20 miles an hour for a distance of | a quarter of a mile in sparsely set- tled districts is considered prima fa evidence of what is unreasonable. This was from the official rules. He | might have ‘added, from the same| source: *‘But the disposition of au-| thorities is to permit a fair rate of speed on boulevards that are free of intersecting roads and curves. To that Ann, simply seething, made no reply. She registered utter dis- dain. But Dicky, %o far from being impressed, apparently forgot he was an officer and certainly proved that he was no gentleman, 5 | of men have organized along the bor- | from !the prohibition | Ana |intrenched unit of “higher-ups’ If,” he remarked, “you are in the habit of using your mnose to express contempt—as you are néw using it I would suggest that you powder occasionally.” After which he rode off, at nearer 40 miles an hour than' the 20 he preY scribed for her, depriving her even of the privileze of the last word. This would have been beyond her, anyway. She was speechless with it Nevertheless, the next time they met, which was the Friday night pre- ceding the Saturday on which Lefty Red had promised actlon, Violet was progressing at a decorous 20 miles an hour. But Dicky stopped her just the same. “I suppose you're going to tell me that I should have been driving 15 miles an hour this time,” she sug gested, with biting sarcasm He was not “No—you're bitten. improeing along that line. But your headlights are illegal.” You're just trying to be hateful,” she flashe I perform my duty as I see it,” he replied. “And—I think etndy ought to keep an eve on you Ann gave him a swift, involuntary glance. Could he mean—— ““Please see that your headiights are properly focused,” he added, quickly ASSINC international border lines, trav- | eling under the protecting blanket of night in swift motor boats that ply the far-flung borders of the United States and even by airplane to evade the watchful eyes of the immigration service, a host of aliens barred from entering this coun- try by the percentage immigration | laws, now more drastic in their opera-| tion than ever before, have set the im- | migration service a new problem | Resourceful and swift to seize a moment when vigilance fails, a group | ders a machine designed to cheat they purpose of the law—a machine which up to a year ago functioned with the precision of a watch. “‘Bootleggers,” | they were called. The term came | Secretary of Labor Davis, and | the merchandise in which they deal | is not liquid, but human. The busi- | ness has one trait in common with | the law-defying . citizen who flaunts law. = Swift death | comes to those linked with the ne- farious enterprise who ‘“squeal the profits are high, perhaps | higher than those reaped by boot- | leggers of the other type. | Moving swiftly to prevent invasion | of the United States by hordes of | aliens who for one weason and an other cannot meet the quota or race | requirements of the immigration laws, the immigration service has set itself the task of keeping the borders of the Natlon free of this illegal traffic in human flesh. Tts answer to the men who deal in the transpor- tation of aliens {llegally is the border patrol, a strongly organized, keen, well trained ands thoroughly _able body of men, quick to follow a lead and equally swift to stop illegal entry. Thelr activities have virtually closed down the business of human bootlegging on the Mexican border, and now they are transferring their forces to the Canadian border, where until a few months ago a .strongly and thelr tools in the illicit transportation of - human beings waxed fat and wealthy from the profits gained of gullible and ignorant foreigners. From Duluth to Buffalo and east of the city at the head of Lake Erie centering in and near Detroit, where the Detroit River offers only a half- mile-wide strip of water to prevent the ingress of aliens illegally coming in, these traffickers in human hopes and aspirations plied their trade. Not only did they prey upon the helfiless immigrant, barred from entry by the immigration laws, charging fabulous prices for running ‘him across a nar- row strip of water, but they used foul and devious ways of fleecing him of the last penny hard earned in his na- tive country across the sea. * ok ok I ITTLE they cared that only “about one of every dozen of the ig- norant bewildered creatures they shipped into this country in boatloads stayed here safe from the vigilant eyes of police and the network of in- spection that Is spread everywhere to catch aliens illegally in the United States. What became of the eleven others did not matter to these des- perate criminals, for they played a game for high stakes, their | th |in the Great Lake: | him is Robe Carl White, One might have believed he was go- ing to let it go at that. One, that i who did not know him as well as Ann. “I had.” he remarked with a grin ‘no intention of making fufeher com ments on your personal appearance. But inasmuch as you seem to expect something along that line, I'll say that your nose is certainly powdered tonight. Has it ever occurred to you that there is such a thing as a proper medium””’ “It has occurred to me.” she re- plied, with great dignity, “that some one should teport you to your su periors. “1 dare you to,"” said he, with a grin. He had Her there, too. Ann real- ized one couldn’t ask to have a State patrolman disciplined for speaking of a lack or superfiuity of powder on one’s nose without being ridiculous. Oue thing is certain, however. Ann had been more occupled that week with the thought of Dicky and his im- pudence than with the thought of pay rpll robbers E R VEN when she drove into Main street the next morning Dicky was more actively in her thoughts than the pay roll. Main Street pre sented its usual Saturday morning aspect—sunshine and mild traffic and swirt of dust that was being of dollars a night, always with the possibility they might have a run ning battle with the meager Fed. eral patrol that before the advent of the border patrol attempted to stop flood tide of unlawful entr he average American ha idea of the magnitude of the ta over in Europe are literally of aliens watching and wa an opportunity to come to th ised land. gration little k., for millions ing_ for prom Only the percentage immi law bars them, and preyed upon by agents of the alien “hootleg. gers,” and often by steamship agents, hoping to turn a penny into their own pockets, they left their home lands by hundreds and thousands, coming to Mexico, Cuba and Canada. The Mexican border traffic has been pret. ty well stopped, and Cuba sends only a few to the Southern coast, but up neighborhood the traffic went on as usual until the bor- der patrol took a hand. The spearhead of the border patrol is the Secretary of Labor, and under silent law- ver, who,sits in his office in Washing ton and directs the far-flung activities of these sleuths of the border. One of White's jobs is to handle the busi- ness of preventing illegal alien entry. Organized into districts, the borders of the United States are patrolled to- day by hundreds of members of this efficient border patrol, who work from their local headquarters, but who are all accountable to the silent man in Washington. \ Churning the waters of the Detroit River, weaving in and about the Thou- sand Islands, patrolling the turbulent Niagara River and the coasts of the Great Lakes, the members of this pic- turesque body of hard-boiled men have virtually shut down the traffic in aliens. Some of their feats would challenge the pen of a Conan Doyle did he not know the far-seeing or- ganization that weaves its threads through every country on the globe and sends them information on which to make arrests. Jan Wroblewski of Cracow, Poland, wants to come to the United States. He inquires of the United States con sulate and is told the quota is full and he must wait a year before com- ing to.America. But Jan wants to come right away. He has the money and can break his home ties. Some hanger-on’ finds Jan's ear, and the ignorant immigrant takes passage on a vessel for Halifax. He lands there and is sent across Canada to Windsor, just across the river from Detroit. Jan has come the underground route so far without hindrance. Here he falls into the hands of the men.” They sound him out and dis- cover . his financial status. They charge Jan from $100 to $1.000 for the itrip across the Detroit River. And ‘while he Is waiting for the trip in a swift motor boat he is engaged in some “sucker”” game that swiftly robs him of the rest of his hard-earned money. * ok ok ok COMES a dark night, and Jan is loaded on the motor boat with a score of other aliens. They put out from the Canadian shore and make ‘the trip across safely. But as they draw near a boat challenges them. and they are stopped. Tn the ensuing “inside | By ROYAL BROWN tended to by the watering cart's phleg- matic advance. The business section had been watered, and Ann, stopping at Eb Sear's newsstand, applied her brakes warily to avold a skid Zb gave her his customary wink as he handed over several packages, with the larger one eontaining the pay roll among, them. Ann placed the packages in Violet and started Violet's engine. As she passed the bank, Chief gave her a nod. Ann returned his nod. And then— ¥rom a side street just ahead a touring car emerged. There was but one man in it—the driver. To the casual eye it suggested no menace. Chief certainly regarded it unmoved, even when it apparently stalled, block ing Violet's advance. But Ann! Her heart seemed to have stopped. She glanced first right and then left. On the curb stood a man with a bashed nose and funny- looking ear. On the other side of the street stood another nan. They were both of them, she poised to spring. Then—they actually springing. Ann gritted her pretty teeth slammed on her brakes. Violet sponded gallantly. This was a little game Violet remembered well. If Ann chose to play it in Main street with Chief looking on, that was her business. Violet's business was to skid. If anybody got in Violet's way that was their business—and mis. fortune. That it misfortune saw, were and was the Chelsea ¢ no one could clone’s doubt result Violet's left rear wheel fouled | him. Anyway it hit him below the belt and landed him back in the gut ter. There he lay, somewhat dazed | Lefty was more fortunate. He had | time to jump back onto the b | stune before Violet got around to him He was not sure what Violet's next nicve was to be—or his. t that polnt Chief came to life. “Hi"" he shouted, This was addressed to Ann who, 80 culprit. }He had seen her knock down one pedestrian and narrowly miss an other, That these were criminals, contemplating crime, never occurred to him. Was he not present in uni- | form? Could they not see him? And | thereby be deterred? The answer to the first two ques. | tions was certainly yes. The answer | to the last was absolutely no. “Hi!" shouted Chief again growing indignation. Ann didn't even hear him. Viole: was skidding not wisely but too well. | Ann’s hat had chosen this instant to | slip down and totally obscure the vision of one eye. But she wrestled with Violet's wheel. Then | she remembered to take her foot off | the brake. Violet gave a last skid and headed approximately toward home. Ann gave Violet the gas. Violet's direction, however, was only approximate. Chief, retreating so | hastily that he all but sat down, saw | Violet carom against the curb, skid | once more and then, straightening out, | start up Main street as fast as she | could go. At that point Dicky appeared on his | motorcycle. “Go and get her!” shouted Chief. I want her—she knocked a man down—-" Instead, Dicky hurtled on past. And Chief began to blink his eves, wonder- ing if perhaps all this wasn't a crazy dream * % JFOR Dicky proceeded to commit ob- vious and apparently unwarranted | assault on the man whom Violet had so narrowly missed. Dicky poked this individual plump in the stomach with the butt of the short but extremely serviceable billy that he was carrying in_bis right hand. | Lefty promptly sat down, the bet ter to digest this In the meantime straight at the touring car, with Dicky lunged like phantoms over the | commissions running into thousands|gun fight Jan and two others are while the operators of the craft desert it and get v s That is the way many the aliens end. The others, if they landed, are taken in by the po- lice, wandering in a strange land, more often than not penniless and utterly unable to take care of them- selves. The fate of most of them is depor | tation, for the United States Govern- ment will send them back to original port of embarkation ve | quickly indeed, the expense being borne by the steamship company. Tipped off by their agents in foreign lands, the members of the border patrol have |lain in wait for the party of which | Jan was a member from the time it was organized Maybe there were 19 aliens in the {lot. “The money is Xividd by the chief into three sections, of which the unner gets a third. The chief sits back and lets the other fellow do the work, with its attendant risk, while | the higher-up gets his without turn ing a hard. One important phase of the smug- | glers’ game is getting immigrants to | leave their homes in foreign lands. In order to obtain this end, they send emissaries abroad who pass the word around that a man in Canada has a drag with the United States authori ties and can get any one across the border for a small sum. Often these underworld ambassadors induce for- | eigners to risk the savings of a life- time to realize their ambition—a berth |in America. In the end the alien often finds the smuggler has double- crossed him by tipping off the immi. gration officers. _ When the man aliens come alone their experiences are sad enough, but the situation becomes real human tragedy when a whole family suc- cumbs to the wiles of the agent abroad. The spectacle of a mother standing on the dock of a strange land, children clinging to her skirts, her chance of escaping detection about one in twelve, is heartrending indeed. It has happened many times, with the entire family caught and sent back to the homeland, penniless killed, smuggling aw £ o are tinuing life on the old scale. Just a few days ago 60 aliens, including a number of women and children, who sent back via the deportation route. Three bodies found in the Detroit River recently told a mute tale of the tragedy which follows the smugglers. The eyidence indicated that the smug- fl}‘lng craft had been discoyered by the border patrol and the aliens knocked on the head when the smug- glers faced capture with their human frgight. K F $UT'HESE smugglers will stop at nothing when facing capture,’ the border patrol, says. “They are more dangerous than rum runners and more contemptible than hi-jackers. They have no principle, no’conscience and will not hesitate at murder. Our officers are given orders to keep un- der cover as much as ible when effecting captures. iny of the smugglers have threatened our men re- | | Chelsea. proved quicker on his feet in | that spring than Lefty Red and as a | far as Chief was concerned, was the | still | climbed | their | and with wasted opportunity for con- | had been smuggled into Detroit were | ‘Walter Brooks, inspector in charge of up over its side and landed en the driver’s head. The driver of the car was Louie the Dope. To the latter, as a mark of re spect, Dicky presented a crack on the head ‘and a pair of steel bracelets all in shorter time than it took Chief to tell {t afterwards. This left the Chelsea Cyclone to be attended to. Dicky landed on him juei as he was reaching for his revolver Lefty wasn't dead—he only wished he was. In the meantime Ann and Viole had gone back home, carrying the pay roll with them. Ann never knew how she got there. The first thing she knew she was in the garage —ver: thoroughly in it. One ~ of Violet's fenders was crumpled as a result of Violet’s im pact with the curbing, and Violet's headlights, she suspected, were prob. b smashed too. Ann didn't care | She simply let her head drop to he arms as they rested on Violet's steer | ing wheel and shivered | “This, she realized wouldn't do. | She must pull herseif together. But =he | continued to sit just as she was | thankful that her mother had gone away for the day, until sudden | something that sounded like a troop of light artillery going into action aroused her. | _Ann stiffened, but Dicky left his mount marched into the garage. her head and met his eyes. Her nose certainly needed powder ing now But he didn't mentiva t | fact ‘You dam | “So that was ing skidding.” s blinking rapidly she babbled. But I'm going to cry.” And cry she certainly did. And briefly, State Patrolman Richard Curtis’ Duer stood there as helples as a man can be at such a time. Ther emembered first aid Now first aid is a part of a State patrolman’s training. If Ann had just been saved from drowning, for instance, instead of being engaged in drowning herself in tears, the rules |and the regulations of the service would have told Dicky just what to | do. As it was, he had to fall back on the final rule, which is, “When in doubt use your best judgment.’ Dicky used his best judgment. First he impulsively swept the packages from the seat beside Ann. In spite of her extremity Ann gasped when the biggest hit the floor. ““The pay roll”" she gasped “Hang the pay roll!" replied Dicky occupying the spot the pay roll had vacated hen he proceeded to render firs in a way which might bave sur | prised his superiors. And Ann as | well. But then so many surprising | things had happened to Ann that morning that—well: | “On’ was all Ann said. And that was all she could say. | For Dicky continued to render first aid | according to his best judgment with | his armd very tight around her. | 'And that is how Dicky lost his | shield. Lost it because the Mas | chusetts State patrol is not only | young man’s game but an unmarried | man's game as well; lost it because | he had suddenly discovered he wanted | something else more. | They were married, Dicky and the something-he-wanted-more, in Septem. ber. They went on a motor trip Yor their honeymoon. But not in Violet Dicky said that Ann had taught Violet bad habits. ‘Want me to show you how to skid on dry pavements?” he asked as the: passed the spot where she had skidded | into his life of a drenched June even ing Ann_shook | “Losing vou | “You certainly | "Ann glanced up at him | in her eyes | “But that,” she murmured, *w; | was before you and T were—us!” (Copyright, 1925.) did not sti outside and Ann raised little why idlot you he said were practic I'r 1 think | aid a her head. nerve?’ he teased had plenty then.” her hear and boasted | taken alive.” Were it not for the espionage sys tem 1 use all over the world, the border atrol would find it difficul to stop the fl of allens across the border, even with their augmented numbers, for the Canadian border i hundreds of miles long, the facilities for crossing the line easy and the guards far apart. Even though th patrol has fast launches which it can press into use to overtake the fast the smugglers, it has no to cope with one recently put into use on the Detroit River. This ft is a former gold cup defender, capable of a mile a minute, and he: owner is said to be paid $200 a week rent for her use. Before the border patrol shifted its activities to the Canadian border m migrants were brought across the in ternational line by the hundreds, cross ing in broad daylight, for $5 a head Those were t" times for the smusg glers. before the immigration restric tion law went into eact, for about all the aliens missed were the literacy tests, the lunacy tests d the medical examinations. Few of them were ap prehended in those golden days of alien smuggling. But that day has gone, not to return The border patrol itself the invisible wall of America drawing a thin shield of manpowe across the international line and up holding the sovereign law of the land Tt operates in swift fleets of water craft_along the Gulf coast to catch vessels plying from Cuba across to Florida and the swampy coast of Louis fiana. It operates from airplanes along the Rio Grande River, and now it is cutting down the number of aliens crossing the northern interna tional border, until immigration au- thorities predict the day is not far distant when “bootlegging” of aliens will be lost in the past N | Did You Know That— 'WENTY-SIX thousand lives, nea: | * iy five times the number Kkilled on | both sides in the battle of Gettysburs. were lost in traffic accidents during the last year. In addition, more than | 700,000 persons were injwred Peér | manently from the same causa® More than a. third ¢ cme auto victims were children. Smashed automodlies and other property destroyed in trafic accidents amounted to the appalling sum of $1,000,000,000. they would never be as constituted 'ABRICS are now waterproofed by plating with a thin coat of rub ber, the process much resembling the ordinary electroplating of metals? The process is said to simplify the water- proofing of garments in a great degree. NEARLY 50,000,000 stems of ban. anas are shipped from the West Indies to the United States each year? It requires 18 months to plant and mature the fruit. [USING the scales of herring as ma- terial, manufacturers are now turn- ing out artificlal pearls that sell for as high as $200 each. Only experts can tell them from the I}