The evening world. Newspaper, October 22, 1921, Page 14

ome 2 THE made up 4 dozen and Lave them yet. We tried to deliver them at the ad- dress which she wrote down for us, bus ahe had moved away and left.no other address. .. , Still it taught me a les- gon, If the Prince of Wales himself came into this shop for a sitting to- morrow, he would have to pey a de- posit.” When Mgil left the photographer’s shop ten minutes later, he hed the twelve pictures underneat> 1. arm, and the raised flap om tho cash regis- ter said “$20.” And not only did he have the pictures, but he had the card om which the gin with the dog had written her name and address: Miss Molly Ingestre 351 West 72d Street New York City It was a dashing, unmistakable hand- writing. The capital “Y” in “York” looked like Neptune's trident; the cap- ital ‘M" in “Molly” resembled a three- legged stool on which the god of the sea might rest himself. Of course it was reprehensible in Mell to have bought the pictures, al- though it might be said that he had @cquired them in much the same spirit as he would have purchased a paint- ing by Asti, or one of Benda's beauti- ful heads of Miss America. But when he finally renched his room and had EVENING Disguising his band as well as he could, he wrote across the bottom on one of the photographs, “Yours cver— Molly to Mell. And in his own handwriting he com- posed the following note to the lady who had so recently worn his ring: “Dear Margaret: Do you think it likely that I shali do ‘anything rash’ with such consolation near at hand? With best wishes for your future ‘hap- piness, I am”—— He thought fo a min- ute how best to close it, and then-- “Yours cordially,” he wrote, with a bit- ter little flourish of his pen, “Old Bum- dlefoot.” Heretofore you have heard him briefly styled as Mell, but his full name was Melville Van Renssellaer Scrym- ser, and although you might not think {t of one with a name like that, he had been born as poor as any Tom, Dick or Harry. But although he was poor himself, Mell's Aunt Agnes was the Mrs. Van Renssellaer, and in her auto- cratic, overbearing way, she hail al ways made a pet of Master Mell, This may sound nicg, but -it very often wasn’t, for Aunt Agnes was ore of those thorough old ladies who love and hate with equal intensity—and everything she didn’t love she hated and did it well, too. She had a com- manding voice when excited, and such WORLD’S FICTION SECTION, waited for Aunt Agnes’s lightning to strike him. He didn’t have jour to wait. “Dear Melville,” she wrote ack, “I'm glad you’re not hurt. “I happened to be in the room when Margaret received your photograph. What a beautiful girl! “I shall come to New York next Monday afternoon on the 4 o'clock train and shall stay a day or two. Please go to the house and have the second floor well aired. gWhen I come I should like to meet this ‘Molly’ of yours, I take it, of course, that her family is a good one, “Margarct had already told me that you had decided to disagree, At first I was furious, but when [ saw the photograph you sent her, I began to forgive you”"—— Mell read the letter-three times and then he slowly turned tosone of the remaining eleven photographs. “Young lady,” said he, “within the last few days I've lost a fiancee and a perfectly good car, And now something tells me that unless [ find you within the next few days, I'm going to lose a legacy and a perfectly good aunt rr Sea Tho more Mell less he liked te “Tf there's hought it over, the one thing that Aun! HE DID BETTER THAN HE HAD EXPECTED, AND, AFTER HE HAD PICKED -HIMSELF UP, IT WAS ONLY NATURAL THAT HE SHOULD HELP TO RECAPTURE THE FRIGHTENED DOG, fooked at the pictures longer than was good for him he did an utterly inde- fensible thing, fo which it can only be pleaded that he must have been still slightly unbalanced from the shock of his accident—to say nothing of the sting he felt for having been jilled that morning * “T know what I'll do!" he suddenty told himself. “rll send one of these pictures to Margaret and make her think that I've had another gir! all the time” To which thought he added the distinctly inslegant reflection: “It'l! make her think she’s not the only peb- ble on the beach!” & manner that even the servants re ferred to her with unconscious awe as “the madam.” “T wonder what she'll say,” thought Mel, “when she hears about the car!” EK had decided to stay in the city until the storm bad a chance to blow over, and had written his aunt an account of his advcuture with the lamp-post. Mrs. Van Kensselaer was staying that summer at the old family manor on the Hudson, her town house on Park Avenue being closed until! her return in October. So Mell had gone to his club and there he Agnes won't stand," he himself, “it’s Hes or deception in ans way, shape or form. And if | have to tell her the truth about Molly, she’d never believe me again as long as I live. I’ve got to tind that girl, and I've got to find her very, very soon!" The address which Molly had written upon the card was one of those ex- clusive boarding-houses which have the outward and inward appearance of private dwellings. A colored girl in a white cap and apron answered Mell!’s ring, “Mivs Molly Ingestre? freaned tr now, Yessuh!" she nid, partly im answer to his question SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1921. and partly in answer to the five-dollar bill which he’ ostentatiously held be- tween his fingers. here for quite a spell—a fine old gem- man, Ah don’t caro what dey says. Miss Molly, at first, she was away at bo’ding school, but fin'’ly she came home to her paw, Just what the trouble is, Ah don’t know, but all at once they left here very sudden and didn’t leave no address behind ‘em. There’s been quite a few inquiring after ‘em since they went—police de- tectives, I think some of them was—— “Last Thursday, on mah afternoon out, Ah was over on East 65th Street near Park Avenue, and Ah saw Miss Molly walking along on the other side of the street as though she lived around there somewheres and was do- ing the shopping.” “Was she alone?” “Well, suh, there was nobody waik- ing side by side. And maybe Ah im agined it, but it seemed to me that not far behind her was ono of those same police detectives who had been around here a time or twe paw!” inqguirinte for her T occurred to Mell later that never | before had he bought anything for $5 which had given him such a rich range of emotions, but after he had returned to his room and had looked long and carnestly at the picture on his dresser, one thought in his mind gradually grew head above all the and shoulders others—one of those fine commanding thoughts that have doml- nated the first this spin. “What? That girl do anything wreng?” masculine mind since ancient world began to he asked himself tried.!” “She couldn't if she It was thus perhaps that t} spoke when first they Rhenish the golden Lorele When Meli went ing he told himself that he was merely going for a stroll, but it before his sailors aw the siren—or boatmen when they gazed at out the next morn wasn't long feet had taken him to the corner of Park Avenue and 55th Street Less than t block away was his aunt's house, boarded up for the summery, “Imagine her being as close as this,” he thought, and for a moment his sense of adventure gave wap to thal fecling of awe which cogies upon us «all at times when we marvel at the futes. “If I hadn’t hit the lamp-post,” he mused, “I wouldn't Lave seen her pic- ture, And if I hadn’t seen her picture I might have lived here all this winter and never have known even iiving’—— But she living and, what was more to the point, Mell had simply got to find her. There was not the least doubt about that. Yet all ing and all that afternoon he strolled and looked in vain; and although he had his lunch and dinner that she was was that morn- at the win- dow table of an upstairs restaurant, and kept his eyes on the street, he might just as well have watched the salt and pepper, for all the good it did hina, The dinner was an unusualiy good one, but Mell didn’t seem to enjoy it, ils hopes of the morning growing veaker with every passing course It was dusk when he left the res- taurant, and he was just on the point of giving up the search for the day when his eyes fell upon a very proud- looking Pomeranian that was taking the alr on the end of a leash. Mell glanced at the dog and then with a start he looked at the girl who with it. = Yos—it was certainly Mol'ys was If anything, she looked a little more wistful than her photograph—a wist- fulness that had more sadness in it than Mell liked to see, and fhat filled him more powerfully than ever with that strange desire to comfort her, which he had felt when first he saw her picture. But now that he had found her, it suddenly came to him that another problem, quite as difficult as the first one, had simultaneously presented itself for solution, It is one thing to find a nice girl whom you have never seen before, but it’s quite another thing to make her acquaint- ance on the streets of a large city, Upon reflection he decided to try strategy. The Pom was lagging be hind, and its leas? as a good two long yards A Complete Story Every Saturday “Her paw lived - ——-