STOLEN!
Linda and Dot both felt terribly depressed, in spite of their luxurious
surroundings. Indeed, both girls had showed more spirit on that deserted
island in the Atlantic Ocean, where they had been stranded without any
plane during the early summer. When both their food and their water
supply were limited, and the chances of survival were small. But now
there was nothing to do but wait—wait in this strange, lonely city,
where their only friends—Mr. Von Goss and Mr. Chase—had turned out to be
enemies. And now Mr. Chase was going away, flying south on important
business, so that even he would be lost to them.
“But you will soon be free,” he had said, after he had heard that Linda
had wired for Mr. Eckert.
“In time to stop that picture’s being shown, do you think?” inquired
Linda. “I understand that the rest of it was completed, and that all
that had to be filmed was my double’s part.”
“Yes, I believe that’s what Von Goss said. But surely it won’t be
released for a month or so. I shouldn’t worry. You do hate publicity,
don’t you?” he asked, sympathetically.
“I have always tried to shun it,” answered Linda. “But it seems that I
am being punished now.”
But the young man had gone, and the girls were feeling very blue.
“We’ve got to pull ourselves together!” announced Dot, after a few
minutes of somber silence. “Let’s step out and go to a show tonight!
After all, you paid that thousand dollars bail, and we might as well get
some fun out of it.”
“True,” admitted Linda.
“Not a picture this time. A theatre. I’m sick of movies.”
“So am I.”
“And let’s make a rule, with a forfeit of five dollars, if either of us
mentions that aviatrix, or Sprague, or any other vermin we have met
around the studio, we have to pay the other! Is it a go?”
“Does that include Mr. Chase?” asked Linda, slyly.
Dot poked her companion under the chin.
“I suppose not,” she agreed. “You couldn’t exactly describe him as
‘vermin’.... And besides, I can see that you were rather smitten. And
did he fall for you? Whew!”
Linda blushed.
“He is a nice young man, don’t you think so, Dot?”
“Of course I do. But poor Ralph! How jealous he’d be, if he only knew!”
“Ralph will be furious because I didn’t wire to him to help us out. But
after all, he’s only a personal friend, and of course his assertions
about my innocence wouldn’t carry much weight.”
“We’re agreed, then,” said Dot, as she began to dress for dinner, “that
the tabu subjects are Von Goss, movies, Sprague, and your double. At
five dollars apiece!”
Linda laughed, but she felt much better. Trust Dot to find some fun in
every situation, no matter how unpleasant or dangerous it seemed. They
were able to get seats at a very good play, and in the excitement of the
mystery involved, they forgot all about their own troubles, and had no
need to worry about the forfeit.
It was lucky indeed that they were able to enjoy their evening, for the
next morning held a most unpleasant surprise for them. They had gone for
a walk after breakfast and returned to the hotel about eleven o’clock,
hoping for some word from Mr. Eckert.
The telephone rang and Linda picked it up gaily, expecting it to be the
message. But it proved to be a message of a very different sort a
summons from a police-court in Los Angeles!
“The officer wants you to come downstairs immediately, Miss Carlton,”
the operator told her.
“I’m going too,” announced Dot, following her companion into the
elevator.
A uniformed policeman was waiting for Linda in the lobby. He was a
rough, uneducated person of the lower class, evidently accustomed to
bullying his suspects into submission. He did not return Linda’s feeble
“Good morning,” but merely extended a piece of paper with his right
hand.
“Your bum check!” he snarled. “For bail. You had no right to sign the
name of ‘Linda Carlton’ anyhow, but besides that, there ain’t no funds
to cover it—even if you say you are the real ‘Linda’.”
“No funds!” gasped Linda, staring incredulously at the man. “Why, I keep
five thousand dollars in my check account—just to be ready for any kind
of emergencies that may come up when I’m flying about the country!”
“That’s just the amount that was took out yesterday. By the real Linda
Carlton.” His tone was jeering, as if he were enjoying the situation as
he would a play.
“Oh!” cried Linda. “This is terrible!”
“I’ll say it is,” agreed the policeman. “Now get your hat, and come
along with me. You’re goin’ to jail.”
The girls looked at each other in speechless amazement. This was too
dreadful for words.
“Let me wire for the money,” suggested Dot, suddenly. “I can get it from
my father.”
“Do as you like. But this here forger goes to jail—even if she is a
pretty girl. That ain’t a gonna help her none now!”
“Oh!”
The tears came to Linda’s eyes, in spite of her effort to hold them
back. She felt dizzy and weak. It was all like a hideous nightmare, from
which, try as she might, she could not awaken. She opened her mouth to
speak, but only a stifled sob came. Then, with a hopeless gesture of
powerlessness, she decided to do as she was told.
She turned about desperately and walked towards the elevator like a
criminal going to the electric chair. Dot, still trying to think of some
way to save the situation, waited, hesitating, breathing hard. It was a
tense and horrible moment—until Linda walked right into the arms of her
dear old friend, Mr. Eckert!
“Linda, I’m here!” he said, putting out his arms to catch her, for he
could see that she was blinded by tears. “Dear child, you’re not going
to faint?”
Linda looked up in a daze, too astonished to believe that he was true.
Had her imagination conjured up his kindly presence? But no; Mr.
Eckert’s hands were on her shoulders, supporting her, keeping her from
falling. And beside him was a large, fine-looking man in a blue uniform.
“Oh!” she gasped, in joy and relief, clinging desperately to the elderly
man’s hand.
“What are you doing to Miss Carlton?” demanded the stranger in uniform,
of the policeman. “Hounding her with abuse?”
“This here young lady forged a name and passed a bum check,” he
whimpered.
“What name?” asked the other man.
“Claims she’s Linda Carlton, with five thousand bucks in a bank, where
she’s already overdrew her account.”
“She is Linda Carlton!” announced Mr. Eckert. “I can testify to
that—your superior officer, James A. Brenan, can testify to my
knowledge, for he knows me well. He is Chief of Police in St. Louis.”
“How did you get here so soon, Mr. Eckert?” asked Dot. “We only wired
yesterday.”
“We started immediately, sensing your trouble. And flew day and night.
But I see that we got here just in time.”
“Ten minutes later I’d have been wearing prison stripes!” returned
Linda, now almost herself again. “Oh, Mr. Eckert, I can never thank you
enough.”
“I was only too thankful to be of use, my dear child,” said the
kind-hearted man.
“What shall we do first?” inquired Dot, as the policeman made a move to
slip away.
“Catch the thief,” announced Chief Brenan. “If she has forged a check
for five thousand dollars already, she must have gone away as fast as
she could.” He turned to the Los Angeles policeman. “Go and inform your
station of this as fast as you can.... And meanwhile, we’ll go straight
to the studio of the Apex Film Corporation and find out what we can
about her from the director.”
The policeman departed, and Linda asked Mr. Eckert whether he weren’t
terribly hungry and tired.
“Hungry, yes, but I haven’t had time to think about being tired yet. I
want to get things all straightened out for you first, before I consider
sleeping. We will arrange for a couple of rooms and order a meal before
we go to Hollywood.”
In an incredibly short time the men reappeared from their rooms and ate
a hasty meal that was both breakfast and lunch. Then the whole party,
the two girls, and the two older men chartered a car for Culver City.
“Won’t it be fun to stick out our tongues at that Sprague insect?”
laughed Dot, now enjoying herself hugely. “He was so condescending—so
sure that the other girl was the real thing!”
“And I’m going to insist that they don’t show the picture under my
name!” added Linda.
“It’ll serve Mr. Von Goss right. I’m glad he’s losing money. Remember
how snippy he was to us yesterday, on the lot?”
“He certainly was. Wouldn’t even speak to us!”
“He may get his money back when we catch the impostor,” remarked Chief
Brenan. “She can’t have had a chance to spend much of it.”
“I’ll wager she bought that plane that she was doing stunts with,”
observed Linda. “It certainly was speedy. And she’d want to get out of
the country as soon as possible.”
The short distance to Culver City was covered quickly in the
high-powered car. Dot was the first to run into the studio when they
arrived. She wanted to have the fun of saying, “I told you so,” to that
“fresh Sprig,” as she liked to call him.
The same “publicity girl” took their cards. But, though Mr. Von Goss was
in, she informed them that Mr. Sprague was no longer with the Apex.
“Fired?” asked Dot, hopefully.
“No, I believe not. He left yesterday—to be married to Miss Linda
Carlton.”
“No, he didn’t!” contradicted Dot. “This is Miss Linda Carlton right
here, and she’d rather be dead than married to that shrimp. Your actress
wasn’t Linda Carlton at all—as we’re just about to prove.”
“Really?” remarked the girl, only slightly interested. It was a practice
of hers never to frown or show emotion, lest she encourage wrinkles.
They passed on in to the director’s office, and Linda introduced the two
men and told her story. When she had finished, Mr. Von Goss looked
extremely worried, crestfallen, even defeated. For now Linda’s identity
was established beyond a doubt.
“How then do you account for this license?” he asked, extending the one
with the forged signature to Linda.
“Sprague’s doing, of course!” cried Dot, before Linda had a chance to
answer. “He was in league with that girl. We just heard that they were
married.”
“But how could he manage these licenses?” demanded Von Goss.
“He got hold of a blank somehow, and forged the name. Then when he had
the chance to get hold of the real Miss Carlton’s, of course he
exchanged them.”
The Chief of Police was listening to Dot’s logic with admiration.
“You’re a bright girl,” he said. “And you’ve figured it out just about
right.” He turned to Linda. “You should never have let your own licenses
get out of your hands.”
“I had no idea Mr. Sprague was dishonest,” she said. “But the worst part
of it is, that now I have to fly with a false license.”
“We’ll get yours back when we catch that couple!” promised Von Goss.
“Because we’ve got to catch them. Why, I paid her thirty thousand
dollars for her part in the picture—and if my picture is not shown, I’ll
lose thousands more....”
He looked terribly discouraged.
The Chief of Police rose.
“We must go back now and get to work. Have you any idea, Von Goss, where
this couple went, or what kind of plane they flew in?”
“I heard Sprague say something about South America for a honeymoon,” the
man replied. “He told us to keep his mail for him, till he came back, as
he wouldn’t have any definite address. But I haven’t any idea whether
they expected to fly, or what kind of plane they used if they did.”
“The girl didn’t buy your plane—or steal it?” asked Linda.
“No. It’s still out there. We needed it today for some stills.”
“What kind of plane did she own when she came to the studio?”
“She didn’t own any. She told me that she had left her autogiro at
Spring City, and had flown west with a friend.”
“And you believed every word of it!” was Dot’s taunt. “And never even
asked to see her license, until we showed up and made it necessary.”
“It’s all true,” agreed the director. “I’ve been a fool.”
“If we only knew what kind of plane, it would be so much easier to
follow and catch her,” remarked Linda, sadly.
Mr. Von Goss rose from his desk, and followed the group to the door,
lingering beside Linda, as if he were trying to get up courage to say
something to her. For such a self-possessed man, he seemed unusually
nervous.
“Miss Carlton,” he said, in a humble tone, “won’t you please do that
part of the picture for me?” It seemed strange that a man who could tell
stars what to do, should speak so deferentially to Linda.
“Oh, no, Mr. Von Goss,” she replied immediately. “I couldn’t possibly.
I’m all keyed up for a chase. I want to catch this girl, if it’s the
last thing I ever do!”
“Then let me pay you, say fifty thousand dollars for the use of your
name, and let me show the picture as it is. Nobody would ever guess that
it isn’t you. For she does look astonishingly like you.”
“Wouldn’t I love to see that girl!” said Dot.
Again Linda shook her head. “I don’t want my name in moving-pictures,
Mr. Von Goss,” she said with quiet determination. “Besides, I shouldn’t
like people to think I flew in the dangerous, spectacular way that girl
did. It is harmful to the whole cause of aviation. No; you cannot use my
name in connection with your picture.”
Von Goss knew that she meant what she said, and there was no use of any
further argument. But he was in a terrible fix, and he didn’t know how
to get out of it without losing a great deal of money. Certainly he
couldn’t use the name of the girl—whatever it was—for when she was
caught, the whole world would know that she was a criminal.
A solution of his problem, however, suddenly suggested itself to Linda.
“I have it, Mr. Von Goss!” she cried, turning about. “Use Ann Harding!
She’s a flier, and a popular actress besides. She can do the stunts, and
probably will prove more of a drawing card to the public than I could
hope to be.”
“Ann Harding!” repeated the man. “But she belongs to another studio.”
“Borrow her! Pay her! You’ll save your picture.”
“I believe you’re right, Miss Carlton,” he admitted, with a sigh of
relief. “That ought to save the situation.”
The four visitors left the studio and hurried in their car back to the
hotel. But no news of the couple had been received by any of the Los
Angeles police. Linda therefore determined to pack a box of supplies and
to set out, that very afternoon, on the search, inquiring at the
airports they passed as they flew towards Mexico.
Just before sitting down to her late lunch with Dot, she wired the news
to her aunt, informing her of her plans, and asking that additional
funds be put into her checking account. Then she called the airport on
the telephone.
“This is Linda Carlton,” she said. “I want you to have my autogiro in
readiness for a long trip. Plenty of gas and oil. I will call for it
inside of an hour.”
“Linda Carlton?” repeated the voice at the other end of the wire.
“Autogiro?... Must be some mistake.... Miss Carlton flew away in her
autogiro last night, about eight o’clock. She paid the bill, and said
she wouldn’t be back!”