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Show I I 1 A "Parson's" Plight I 1 1 I I I I By Walt Gregg. H - HE car bumped and thumped along, and Its passengers for the most part busied themselves with their papers. It was a typical street car crowd, Indifferent to Its surroundings, unmindful un-mindful of its fellow fel-low humanity. It was the- sort of crowd !n which a man could sit next to Ms long lost brother and fall to recognise him. Tho girl, half unconsciously, began ber mental Inventory. The first classification classi-fication was the stout man a little to her right, a man of middle age. a stout man with a kindly face, evidently a man who enjoyed tho good things of life with more or less discretion, as the occasion might require Yet when he looked up from his paper with a little start the girl suddenly decided that she might be mistaken as to the mildness that there was a goodly store of nervous energy beneath the veneer. "I'll put you flown as a grocer," she aald to herself as she opened her mental men-tal classification book. "You are one of the partners, and you know the food things In stock through long experience." ex-perience." And then the stout man looked up again In his jerky way and gave her a fleeting glance and frowned as his gare went back to the printed page. "Pm getting a better opinion of you," said the girl to herself. "You are a good deal of a character alter BlL" The stout man's next neighbor at his right was a boy, a plain, freckled, callow boy. He stared at the advertising adver-tising signs across the car and occasionally occa-sionally his lips moved ae if he might be spelling them out "You may be a comer," thought the girl, "but I doubt If you ever command any armies, or wreck any hearts. You aro down as an indeterminate quantity. quanti-ty. Next" The man at tho right of the boy was an impassive looking person, a quiet, unobtrusive man of 50. dressed in ft shabby black suit with a shabby black overcoat The gloves he wore were shabby, too, and his hat had seen much bettor days. There was a brush-ed-up look about him, however, as If he meant to make the best of his limited lim-ited possessions. He was a sallow-faced sallow-faced man with dark hair and eyes, arid a habit of looking down as If the light annoyed him. The girl felt a touch of sympathy for this melancholy figure tt seemed to her a melancholy figure. She fancied fan-cied the man might have put up a fight against life's conditions for awhile, and then been crowded to the wall. She was afraid he hadn't enough fight left in him to renew the conflict. In the little inventory she was rapidly making he was set down as a discouraged discour-aged preacher who had lost his grip on his' calling. She could read tho hopeless struggle in his face, coupled with a desire for self-effacement The man at the right of the sober-clad sober-clad stranger was a strong contrast to his neighbor. He was comfortably dressed with a slight tendoncy toward loudness He was a well fed. well groomed man of close to 50 who evidently evi-dently took life easy and found all the satisfaction he could tn It In the inventory she made the girl noted the man's handsome scarf pin. his fine new gloves and the heavy gold chain that was looped across his pattern pat-tern vest She set him down mentally men-tally as a prosperous restaurant keeper. keep-er. The girl looked through the window. win-dow. The car had reached 65th street The long ride was half done. It bad been a quiet ride as far as human voices were concerned. The rumble of the car was the only sound that broke the stillness of the foggy morning. Then two men a little ways down the aisle began a mild wrangle over the war. Their voices came to the girl. "I can't understand," said one voice, "why they don't get round in th' rear of th' other fellows an' cut off their supplies " "I s'pose th' other follows are likely like-ly to do th' same thing. They must be watchln' each other like a cat an' moiiBc." "I don't suppose half we hear is anyways reliable." "I s'pose not" "Wonder what's gained by sup-pressln' sup-pressln' th' truth?" "I s'poso they're 'fraid to tell it" "Maybe." Thro was a brief silence. The car rumbled along; the readers stuck to their papers. Nobody had listened or so it seemed to the girl, except the stout man with tho cynical look and herself. The man with the cynical look renewed re-newed his attention to his paper and the girl wont back to the war news. But her restless attention was not absorbed ab-sorbed by the submarines and the aeroplane and the all-qulet-along-the-front official reprots. She saw the sallow sal-low man draw from a side pocket of his shabby coat a newspaper and gravely unfold It. When ho had uncovered un-covered the page, he desired to peruse he spread out the sheet, and held it stiffly In front of him. held it so closely close-ly that it seemed to Indicato weak vision, vi-sion, as if he hadn't been sufficiently handicapped by fate end fortune. Then something happened that suddenly sud-denly quickened the girl's attention. The man had barely spread out his paper when he lowered the upper margin mar-gin a littlo and gave a quick look about him, a look that took in his neighbors and the girl in its swift sweep. It was the expression of his eyes that startled the girl his look was darting and furtive and keen, a look entirely foreign to his personal appearance. Then the paper was raised rais-ed again and his face was hidden. The girl vaguely wondered what this meant She felt troubled. Her face-reading theory was rudely assailed. as-sailed. The car swayed around the corner. The girl, clutching the strap, swayed with it So did the sallow man with the newspaper. He swayed so far to the right that he pressed heavily against his woll-dressed neighbor, and drew back with a murmur apology. And lo! when the girl's watchful eyes beneath the thick lashes looked down they noticed instantly that the heavy gold chain across the pattern I vest had disappeared! The girl was greatly shocked. Yet she contrived to grip hor paper with- i out a tremor. The thing had boon done with such deftness, such cleverness, clever-ness, such quickness, that it quite paralyzed her mental faculties. Could this melancholy, sad-faced man be a thief, a deliberate thief? It didn't seem possible. Womanlike, her sympathies were aroused. There must be an excuse for him a tireless home, a sick wife, hungry children. What could she do? She must be merciful. If he gave up the watch she would let him go. No doubt it was his first offense. Her mind worked rapidly. 8he drew up her wrist bag and brought a lead poncll from Its depths. Then she carefully care-fully printed these words along tho margin of the newspaper: "Give It to me. I will return It to the owner." She did this In a quiet way that she believed had attracted no attention But when she lowered the paper she saw that the cynical man was observing ob-serving her. He looked away instantly, instant-ly, however. She let the written margin overlap a little where the sallow man could not fall to see it If he looked up She Intently watched his face when his gaze finally arose above his newspaper. news-paper. For a second his look distressed dis-tressed and almost frightened her. It was hard and menacing. His right hand suddenly clutched at his Bide. It seemed to tell her ho had a weapon there. No doubt It was meant to scare her. She refused to be Beared. Then his expression softened. He very' slightly nodded. He meant he would take the chance she was about to offer him. She opened her wrist bag and let it slip to the floor at the sallow man's feet. The sallow man Btooped, his newspaper sliding forward and hiding both the wrist bag and his movements. There was a littlo click. Then he lifted the bag and handed it to the black-eyed girl. "Thank you," she murmured, as she took It. She gave a swift side glance. The cynical man was staring at her curiously. 8he did not like this. She was doing her best to help an erring brother. Perhaps she was doing do-ing It awkwardly, but it was the only way she knew. And then her quick mind was stunned by a new anxiety. The thief had failed to put the watch In the bag. She knew this by long experience In' handling the bag and she knew It intuitively. He bad fooled her both by his appearance ap-pearance and by his pretended agreement agree-ment to her plan for helping him. She waB angry. She felt the blood flush her checks. What could she do now? It must be something sudden. She gave a quick glance through the window. They were at Ninth street. Already the crowd in the car was thinning out. The glrl'B mind was a supple one-She one-She reasoned fast If she attempted to call the attention of the robbed man to his loss he wouldn't understand under-stand at first. He looked slow and deliberate. de-liberate. Before she could make him comprehend his loss the adroit robber would be out of the car and Into the crowd and lost to pursuit She mustn't let him get away. It would be easy to draw back a little lit-tle for htm to pass. It would be easy to hold her tongue. It might save her a lot of embarrassment to let him slip by. She was the only ono who knew. But Mary Blanchard had no thought of doing this. She was angry at the roan for having deceived her in that double way, and she was angry at herself for being deceived And then another thought came to her and added to her resentment It was a news item in the paper she had been reading. She could recall it almost al-most word for word. "Took Her Christmas Savings. Anna An-na Heinler of 1171 Armadale road, lost the Christmas fund she had been gathering gath-ering for many weeks. It was stolen from her by an adroit thief on a Grace Park car. She reported her loss to the police, and described the suspected thief as a slckly-looklng man of about 50. No doubt this was the fellow who has boon leading the police a merry chaso for the past month His latest reported haul was only $2.35. but this meant a whole lot to Anna Hcmler. The black-eyed girl gritted her teeth as thl6 resemblance 6wept over her. She was thinking very fast While the car, halting at each crossing, covered a scant quarter-of-a-mlle. her active mind-reel had run out a film of amazing amaz-ing length. Then a quick way of solving the problem flashed upon her. The aisle was pretty well emptied. The city hall stop was just ahead. "Wood street," the conductor called. The girl bent and looked through the window. "Why, it's 9 o'clock'" she cried. Instantly a dozen watches were drawn out "Eight-thirty." said a man In the aisle. "My watch Is gone!" roared the well dressed man. "I've been robbed!" The sallow man had arisen. With a violent push he thrust the girl aside and started for the. exit door. The girl caught her breath. "Stop him," she cried. "Let no one leave the car!" The stout motorman heard the cry. His burly form barred the way. A man on the back platform pushed forward. for-ward. The sallow man had straightened straight-ened up. "What are you stopping me for?" he demanded. And then the tall man got a glimpae of him. "Why, 'parson,'" ho cried, "Is it you ?" The sallow man grinned as the tall man's big hand gripped his arm. "Hullo, Inspector," he said. "Well, well," said the tall man. "I never was so glad to see you, 'parson.' So it's you who has been bothering us all this time and we supposed you were out on the coast Well, this Is a good morning's work." He looked around. "Who lost the watch?" The well dressed man cams forward. "I'm the victim, Inspector." iBSra "What you. Col. Hedges'' Well, ISSS here's your ticker. It's surely a fine iHSSffi one." iKSl "No money could buy it. inspector. SEK The boys of the old regiment gave it iEaSl to mo " HfiBi "Call the t raffle officer, conductor." 'insl the police inspector shouted. "But Kfs say. how did they happen to spot you. HHh 'parson?'" B&kI The sallow man gTlnned again. SPi!! "Tbat black-eyed girl yonder was E&i too sharp for me. I couldn't fool her iflPStfn and I couldn't scaro her. If there's Bf& any credit, she gets It." "May I speak to you. miss?" said the HUn tall Inspector "I'd like to shake HSs hands with you, too. You're in a hur- BP1 ry ?" ftifl "No, replied Mary Blanchard, a lit- tie embarrassed by this attention. Hffw "Then let me present Col. John Hll Hedges, director of public improve- .E&t mentB. who is under peculiar obllga- H tlons to you." "That's right, miss." said the well- LyM dressed man. "Consider me under lasting obligations to you. You man- Hf; I aged it very cleverly." 9sHv(- The inspector looked around. MPT'S "And here's Judge Richard Gar- man," he cried, and the cynical man !M& put out his hand. "I'll admit," he said, "that the young M&Ci lady interested me from the moment Mlifl she came aboard. I even felt a little R&? suspicious. Will you tell us why you Rfr; inspected us all so closely, miss?" mm$. Mary blushed. HkS "It's a habit I've formed," she re- mL plied. "I I like to read the faces in Er$g the car, and and fit them with occu- sBjfr' patlons." She looked at the eminent ;K7,: jurist "I I took you for a grocer, lB air." They all laughed. She looked 'fil"V at the city official. "And I took you - for a restaurant proprietor." And they BF laughed again. K! "And what did you take the 'parson' 'flr' for?" the tall police inspector asked. :! "For Just what he looks to be," the wa I girl replied. "And and, Bomehow, I BL can't help feeling sorry for him." And Hg the tears stood In her oyes. "Come, 'parson,' " said the Inspector R abruptly. Br, |
