Part 2 (1/2)
Late in the afternoon, she noticed that Mr. DeWitt and Mr. Jewell appeared displeased about a story they had found in the Five Star edition of the paper. After reading it, they talked together, and then sorted through a roll of discarded copy, evidently searching for the original.
Finally, Mr. DeWitt called:
”Miss Parker!”
Wondering what she had done wrong, Penny went quickly to his desk.
”You wrote this story?” he asked, jabbing a pencil at one of the printed obituaries.
”Why, yes,” Penny acknowledged. ”Is anything wrong with it?”
”Only that you've buried the wrong man,” DeWitt said sarcastically.
”Where did you get that name?”
Penny felt actually sick, and her skin p.r.i.c.kled with heat. She stared at the story in print. It said that John Gorman had died that morning in Mercy Hospital.
”The man who died was John Borman,” DeWitt said grimly. ”It happens that John Gorman is one of the city's most prominent industrialists. We've made the correction, but it was too late to catch two-thirds of the papers.”
Penny stared again at the name, her mind working slowly.
”But Mr. DeWitt,” she protested. ”I don't think I wrote it that way. I knew the correct name was Borman. I'm sure that was how I turned it in.”
”Maybe you hit a wrong letter on the typewriter,” the editor said less severely. ”That's why one always should read over a story after it's written.”
”But I did that too,” Penny said, and then bit her lip, because she realized she was arguing about the matter.
”We'll look at the carbons,” decided Mr. DeWitt.
They had been taken from the spindles by copy boys, but the editor ordered the entire day's work returned to his desk. Pawing through the sheets, he came to the one Penny had written. Swiftly he compared it with the original copy.
”You're right!” he exclaimed in amazement. ”The carbons show you wrote the name John Borman, not Gorman.”
”I knew I did!”
”But the copy that was turned into the basket said John Gorman. Didn't you change it on the first sheet?”
”Indeed I didn't, Mr. DeWitt.”
Scowling, the editor compared the two copies. Obviously on the original sheet, a neat erasure had been made, and a typewritten letter _G_ had been subst.i.tuted for _B_.
”There's something funny about this,” Mr. DeWitt said. ”Mighty funny!”
His gaze roved about the typewriter table, focusing for an instant upon Elda who had been listening intently to the conversation. ”Never mind,”
he added to Penny. ”We'll look into this.”
Later, she saw him showing the copy sheets to the a.s.sistant editor.
Seemingly, the two men were deeply puzzled as to how the error had been made. Penny had her own opinion.
”Elda did it,” she thought resentfully. ”I'll wager she removed the sheet from the wire basket when she pretended to be making a correction on her own story!”
Having no proof, Penny wisely kept her thoughts to herself. But she knew that in the future she must take double precautions to guard against other tricks to discredit her.