The Girl and the Bill. Bannister Merwin

Working, eating, sleeping, marrying and given in marriage, bearing children and dying—was that all? “But growing, too,” said Orme to himself. “Growing, too.” Would this be the sum of his own life—that of a worker in the hive? It came to him with something of an inner pang that thus far his scheme of things had included little more. He wondered why he was now recognizing this scantiness, this lack in his life.

      He came out of his revery to find himself again at the Madison Street corner. Again he seemed to see that beautiful girl in the car, and to hear the music of her voice.

      How could he best set about to find her? She might be, like himself, a visitor in the city. But there was the touring-car. Well, she might have run in from one of the suburbs. He could think of no better plan than to call that evening on the Wallinghams and describe the unknown to Bessie and try to get her assistance. Bessie would divine the situation, and she would guy him unmercifully, he knew; but he would face even that for another glimpse of the girl of the car.

      And at that moment he was startled by a sharp explosion. He looked to the street. There was the black car, bumping along with one flat tire. The girl threw on the brakes and came to a stop.

      In an instant Orme was in the street. If he thought that she would not remember him, her first glance altered the assumption, for she looked down at him with a ready smile and said: “You see, I do need you again, after all.”

      As for Orme, he could think of nothing better to say than simply, “I am glad.” With that he began to unfasten the spare tire.

      “I shall watch you with interest,” she went on. “I know how to run a car—though you might not think it—but I don’t know how to repair one.”

      “That’s a man’s job anyway,” said Orme, busy now with the jack, which was slowly raising the wheel from the pavement.

      “Shall I get out?” she asked. “Does my weight make any difference?”

      “Not at all,” said Orme; but, nevertheless, she descended to the street and stood beside him while he worked. “I didn’t know there were all those funny things inside,” she mused.

      Orme laughed. Her comment was vague, but to him it was enough just to hear her voice. He had got the wheel clear of the street and was taking off the burst tire.

      “We seem fated to meet,” she said.

      Orme looked up at her. “I hope you won’t think me a cad,” he said, “if I say that I hope we may meet many times.”

      Her little frown warned him that she had misunderstood.

      “Do you happen to know the Tom Wallinghams?” he asked.

      Her smile returned. “I know a Tom Wallingham and a Bessie Wallingham.”

      “They’re good friends of mine. Don’t you think that they might introduce us?”

      “They might,” she vouchsafed, “if they happened to see us both at the same time.”

      Orme returned to his task. The crowd that always gathers was now close about them, and there was little opportunity for talk. He finished his job neatly, and stowed away the old tire.

      She was in the car before he could offer to help her. “Thank you again,” she said.

      “If only you will let me arrange it with the Wallinghams,” he faltered.

      “I will think about it.” She smiled.

      He felt that she was slipping away. “Give me some clue,” he begged.

      “Where is your spirit of romance?” she railed at him; then apparently relenting: “Perhaps the next time we meet——”

      Orme groaned. With a little nod like that which had dismissed him at the time of his first service to her, she pulled the lever and the car moved away.

      Tumult in his breast, Orme walked on. He watched the black car thread its way down the street and disappear around a corner. Then he gave himself over to his own bewildering reflections, and he was still busy with them when he found himself at the entrance of the Père Marquette. He had crossed the Rush Street bridge and found his way up to the Lake Shore Drive almost without realizing whither he was going.

      Orme had come to Chicago, at the request of Eastern clients, to meet half-way the owners of a Western mining property. When he registered at the Annex, he found awaiting him a telegram saying that they had been detained at Denver and must necessarily be two days late. Besides the telegram, there had been a letter for him—a letter from his friend, Jack Baxter, to whom he had written of his coming. Jack had left the city on business, it appeared, but he urged Orme to make free of his North Side apartment. So Orme left the Annex and went to the rather too gorgeous, but very luxurious Père Marquette, where he found that the staff had been instructed to keep a close eye on his comfort. All this had happened but three short hours ago.

      After getting back to the apartment, Orme’s first thought was to telephone to Bessie Wallingham. He decided, however, to wait till after dinner. He did not like to appear too eager. So he went down to the public dining-room and ate what was placed before him, and returned to his apartment just at dusk.

      In a few moments he got Bessie Wallingham on the wire.

      “Why, Robert Orme!” she exclaimed. “Wherever did you come from?”

      “The usual place. Are you and Tom at home this evening?”

      “I’m so sorry. We’re going out with some new friends. Wish I knew them well enough to ask you along. Can you have some golf with us at Arradale to-morrow afternoon?”

      “Delighted! Say, Bessie, do you know a girl who runs a black touring-car?”

      “What?”

      “Do you know a tall, dark girl who has a black touring-car?”

      “I know lots of tall, dark girls, and several of them have black touring-cars. Why?”

      “Who are they?”

      There was a pause and a little chuckle; then: “Now, Bob, that won’t do. You must tell me all about it to-morrow. Call for us in time to catch the one-four.”

      That was all that Orme could get out of her and after a little banter and a brief exchange of greetings with Tom, who was called to the telephone by his wife, the wire was permitted to rest.

      Orme pushed a chair to the window of the sitting-room and smoked lazily, looking out over the beautiful expanse of Lake Michigan, which reflected from its glassy surface the wonderful opalescence of early evening. He seemed to have set forth on a new and adventurous road. How strangely the girl of the car had come into his life!

      Then he thought of the five-dollar bill, with the curious inscription. He took it from his pocket-book and examined it by the fading light. The words ran the full length of the face. Orme noticed that the writing had a foreign look. There were flourishes which seemed distinctly un-American.

      He turned the bill over. Apparently there was no writing on the back, but as he looked more closely he saw a dark blur in the upper left-hand corner. Even in the dusk he could make out that this was not a spot of dirt; the edges were defined too distinctly for a smudge; and it was not black enough for an ink-blot.

      Moving to the center-table, he switched on the electric lamp, and looked at the blur again. It stood out plainly now, a series of letters and numbers:

      Evans, S. R. Chi. A. 100 N. 210 E. T.

      The first thought that came to Orme was that this could be no hoax. A joker would have made the curious cryptogram more conspicuous. But what did it mean? Was it a secret formula? Did it give the location of a buried treasure? And why in the name of common sense had it been written on a five-dollar bill?

      More likely, Orme reasoned, it concealed information for or about some person—“S. R. Evans,” probably. And who was