The Mystery of the Secret Band

“Tell me at supper time, Emmy Lou,” interrupted Pauline. “These people are in a hurry. I’ve got to go.”

Mary Louise was disappointed; she did so want to ask Pauline whether Ida’s story were true. Now she’d have to wait.

She continued her walk down Walnut Street until she came to Ninth, then she turned up to Market Street and entered the department store where she had made the inquiries that morning concerning Margaret Detweiler.

There were not so many people visiting the employment manager that afternoon as in the morning: perhaps everybody thought Saturday afternoon a poor time to look for a job. Mary Louise was thankful for this, and apologized profusely for taking the busy woman’s time again.

“I couldn’t find anybody by the name of Ferguson at the Benjamin Franklin Hotel now,” she said, “or any trace of Margaret Detweiler at all, there. But after I left the hotel it occurred to me that if you would give me the address that Margaret had while she was working here, I might make inquiries at the boarding house, or wherever it was that she lived. They might know something. Do you think that would be too much trouble?”

“No trouble at all,” replied the woman pleasantly. She told the clerk to look in the files again. The address was a number on Pine Street, and Mary Louise asked where that street was located, as she copied it down in her notebook.

“Not far away,” was the reply. “You can easily walk there in a few minutes.” She gave Mary Louise explicit directions.

It was a shabby red-brick house in a poor but respectable neighborhood. A colored woman answered Mary Louise’s ring.

“Nothing today!” said the woman instantly, without giving Mary Louise a chance to speak first.

“I’m not selling anything,” replied the girl, laughing. “I wanted to ask the landlady here about a girl named Margaret Detweiler who used to live here. Could you ask her to spare me a minute or two?”

“All right,” agreed the servant. “Come in.”

She ushered Mary Louise into a neat but gloomy parlor, and in a couple of minutes the landlady appeared.

“I understand you want to ask me about Miss Detweiler?” she inquired.

“Yes,” answered Mary Louise. “I am trying to find her for her grandparents. The employment manager of the department store said she lived here. Is that correct?”

“Yes, it is. Miss Detweiler lived here for about five months. She seemed like a nice quiet girl, with no bad habits. She paid regular till the last month she was here, when she took sick and had to spend a lot of money on medicines and doctor’s bills. Then, all of a sudden, she slipped away without payin’ her bill, and I never saw her again.”

“She owes you money?” demanded Mary Louise.

“No, she don’t now. A couple of weeks after she left, she sent it to me in a registered letter. So we’re square now.”

“Didn’t she send her address?”

“No, she didn’t.”

“Where was the letter postmarked?”

“Center Square. A little town up the state.”

“Do you still have the envelope?”

“No, I haven’t. But I remember the name, because I used to know folks at Center Square.”

“Didn’t Margaret say anything in her letter about how she was getting on or what she was doing?” asked Mary Louise.

“There wasn’t any letter. Just a folded piece of paper.”

“Oh, that’s too bad! And what was the date?”

“Sometime in January. Let’s see, it must have been near the start of the month, for I remember I used some of that money to buy my grandson a birthday present, and his birthday’s on the seventh.”

“Well, I thank you very much for what you have told me,” concluded Mary Louise. “Maybe it will lead to something. I’ll go to Center Square and make inquiries. You see,” she explained, “Margaret Detweiler’s grandparents are very unhappy because they haven’t heard from her, and I want to do all in my power to find her. Margaret is all they have, and they love her dearly.”

The woman’s eyes filled with tears.

“And may you have good luck, my dear child!” she said.

CHAPTER VII

The Abandoned House

When Mary Louise returned to the hotel, she found everything quiet. She went immediately to the fourth floor; Mrs. Hilliard was in her sitting room, knitting and listening to the radio.

“Has anything happened since I left?” asked the girl eagerly.

“No,” replied the manager. “Except that another guest has departed. Your friend Pauline Brooks came back, packed her bag, paid her bill, and left. Of course, she was only a transient anyway, but the hotel is so empty that I was hoping she would stay a while.”

“I met her on the street with her aunt,” Mary Louise said. “But she didn’t have time to talk to me. Did you question her about Ida’s story?”

“Yes, and she said it was true that Ida did come into her room to make the bed at that time, because she, Miss Brooks, had slept late. But she didn’t know how long the maid had stayed because she left the hotel before Mrs. Macgregor discovered her loss and screamed. So it is possible that Ida went back into Mrs. Macgregor’s room.”

“Personally I believe the girl is innocent,” stated Mary Louise.

“So do I. As I said, she has been with me two years, and I have always found her absolutely trustworthy. It probably was a sneak thief. The police are on the lookout for somebody like that.”

“Did you talk to Miss Stoddard?”

“No, I didn’t. She went out this afternoon.”

“She’ll bear watching,” remarked Mary Louise.

“I think so too,” agreed the other… “Now, tell me what you did with yourself this afternoon.”

Mary Louise related the story of her visit to Margaret Detweiler’s former boarding house and the scant information she had obtained. “Is Center Square far away?” she asked.

“Oh, a couple of hours’ drive, if you have a car. But do you really think it would do you any good to go there? The girl was probably only passing through and stopped at the postoffice to mail her letter to the landlady.”

“Yes, I am afraid that is all there was to it. But I could at least make inquiries, and after all, it’s the only clue I have. I’d never be satisfied if I didn’t do the very best I could to find Margaret for her grandparents.”

Mary Louise stayed a little longer with Mrs. Hilliard; then she went to her own room to dress for dinner. But suddenly she was terribly homesick. Jane and the boys would be coasting all afternoon, she knew, for there would still be plenty of snow left in the country, and there was a dance tonight at another friend’s. Max would be coming for her in his runabout; she would be wearing her blue silk dress – and – and – Her eyes filled with tears. Wasn’t she just being terribly foolish to stay here in Philadelphia, missing all those good times? And for what? There wasn’t a chance in the world that she’d discover the thief, when even the police were unsuccessful.

“But I’ll never learn to be a detective until I try – and – learn to accept failures,” she told herself sternly, and she knew that, all things considered, she had not been foolish. It might be hard at the time to give up all the fun, but in the long run it would be worth it. She ought to be thanking her lucky stars for the chance!

Somewhat reassured, she dressed and went downstairs to the reception room, where the radio was playing. She found the two Walder girls, whom she had met at noontime when Mrs. Macgregor raised the commotion. Mary Louise greeted them cordially.

“It’s beginning to rain,” said Evelyn Walder, “so Sis and I thought we’d stay in tonight and try to get up a game of bridge. Do you play, Mary Lou?”