A QUESTION OF COLOR.
After Owen had seen Jake Hines safely locked up in a local police
station, he went back to Dallas to fulfill this mission which had
brought him to Chicago. “I want you to explain to me about that letter
you got from the mail box,” he said. “You got the wrong letter by a
mistake, of course? Instead of the one which you had mailed to your
brother, you got the pink envelope which the Reverend Doctor Moore
dropped into the box?”
“Yes,” answered Dallas, “when the letter carrier opened the box and took
out the mail, and I caught sight of that square, pink envelope lying on
top of the heap, I jumped to the conclusion that it was mine, and I
grabbed it and hurried away, fearing that he might change his mind about
giving it to me. You see, Owen, I was very much excited. The letter
which I had received from my scapegrace brother that day was very
startling. It informed me that he was in great trouble, and was about to
do something desperate--the letter didn’t state what--and that the only
thing which could prevent him from taking this step was my coming to
Chicago immediately. It warned me, too, that I mustn’t let a soul in New
York know where I was going.”
“That was Hines’ work, of course,” said Owen. “He couldn’t come to you
in New York, so he contrived that scheme to bring you out to him.”
“Yes; but I didn’t suspect anything like that. I was very much worried.
From the tone of Chester’s letter I feared that he contemplated suicide,
and I was awfully scared. But I didn’t very well see how I could get out
to him, because”--she hesitated, and blushed painfully--“because I--I
didn’t have the fare, Owen. I had been sending more than I could spare
to Chester recently, to help him to get out of a scrape, and I was very
hard up. So I had to write him that I was very sorry, but I really
couldn’t come to Chicago.”
“And then?” said Owen eagerly.
“Then, after I had mailed that letter, I suddenly thought of the
engagement ring which you had given to me, dear. I hated to pawn it, of
course, but I was so scared about Chester, and I--I thought you
wouldn’t mind, under the circumstances.”
“So that’s how you raised the fare to Chicago!” said Owen, with a smile
of great relief.
“Yes; and when I found that I could go, naturally I wanted to get back
that letter; for I feared the effect it might have upon my brother.”
“So you waited at the box until Pop Andrews came to collect the mail,
and you prevailed upon him to violate the rules and let you have it, and
he handed you the wrong letter,” said Owen. “So far, so good. And now,
Dallas, when you found that you had the Reverend Doctor Moore’s pink
envelope, with the hundred-dollar bill inside, what did you do with it?”
“When I got to my room at the boarding house, I started to tear the
letter up without opening it, still thinking, of course, that it was the
one which I had sent Chester. When I caught sight of the money inside,
and realized the mistake I had made, I was in a quandary. The
hundred-dollar bill and the letter which the envelope contained were
each in four pieces. I was afraid to go to the post office and explain
how it had happened, because I knew that if I did so it would get
Carrier Andrews into trouble for violating the rules. So I decided to
cut some sticking plaster into small strips, and paste the pieces
together. I made quite a neat job of it; then I addressed a fresh
envelope, inclosed the patched-up letter and hundred-dollar bill, and
dropped it into a mail box.”
Owen drew a deep breath of relief. “And I suppose the envelope which you
addressed was a white one?”
“Yes. I didn’t have any pink ones at the boarding house.”
“And that explains, of course, why they thought at Branch X Y that the
letter was missing from the mail. Naturally they didn’t think to go
through the white envelopes. No doubt by this time the Reverend Doctor
Moore’s friend in Pennsylvania is in receipt of his hundred-dollar bill.
Your explanation, Dallas, clears the mystery! What a gink I am not to
have thought of that solution before!”
But suddenly a puzzled look came to Inspector Sheridan’s face. “There’s
one point that isn’t cleared up yet: If you got the wrong pink envelope,
Dallas, what became of the right one? The letter which you sent to your
brother ought to have been in the mail still.”
“And so it was,” answered Dallas, with a smile. “When I reached here I
found that Chester was already in receipt of it.”
“But how could that be? They searched all through the mail at Branch X
Y, and failed to find any square, pink envelope.”
“The letter which Chester received was in a square, white envelope,”
said Dallas. “I noticed that as soon as he showed it to me. And,” she
went on, with a puzzled frown, “that’s something which I can’t
understand at all. I know that it sometimes happens that in a box of
colored stationery a white envelope will get mixed with the tinted ones,
but I am ready to take oath that the envelope in which I inclosed
Chester’s letter was pink. If it wasn’t so perfectly ridiculous I should
be inclined to believe that it must have changed color while in the
mail.”
“Wait a minute!” exclaimed Owen, an inspiration coming to him. “I think
I’ve got the answer. This envelope was exactly the same shape and
design as the rest in the box, wasn’t it, Dallas?”
“Yes; exactly the same as the others, except that it was white instead
of pink.”
“And it appeared to you to be pink?”
“Yes; and I am not color blind--if that is what you are going to imply,”
replied Dallas, mildly indignant.
“I’m not quite so sure of that,” said Owen, with a smile. “I’ll grant
that you are not color blind under ordinary conditions, but these were
not ordinary conditions.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“It was a dark afternoon when you addressed that envelope, and the
electric light over your desk at the office was turned on, wasn’t it?”
The girl nodded. “Yes, that’s so; but still----”
“And the electric globe over your desk throws such a strong light that
you have a piece of paper around it to shade it, haven’t you, Dallas? A
piece of red paper; I noticed it the other day.”
A look of enlightenment came to the girl’s face. “Why, yes; I understand
how it happened now. That red shade around the electric light made that
white envelope look pink, just like the rest.”
“Exactly!” cried Owen happily; “and that solves the mystery of the
missing pink envelope. I’m mighty glad now that I followed you to
Chicago, Dallas.”