Part 8 (2/2)
”One hundred dollars.”
”Too little. And the Professor?”
”Five hundred.”
”Too much. He couldn't afford it, could he?”
”He said it was more than his salary warranted, but he wanted to be patriotic.”
”Oh, well; the rich grocer took them off his hands, perhaps. No disloyal words from the Professor or the supervisor?”
”No, indeed; they rebuked Mr. Herring and made him stop talking.”
Josie nodded, thoughtfully.
”Well, who else did you find disloyal?”
”No one, so far as I can recollect. Everyone I know seems genuinely patriotic--except,” as an afterthought, ”little Annie Boyle, and she doesn't count.”
”Who is little Annie Boyle?”
”No one much. Her father keeps the Mansion House, one of the hotels here, but not one of the best. It's patronized by cheap traveling men and the better cla.s.s of clerks, I'm told, and Mr. Boyle is said to do a good business. Annie knows some of our girls, and they say she hates the war and denounces Mr. Wilson and everybody concerned in the war.
But Annie's a silly little thing, anyhow, and of course she couldn't get out those circulars.”
Josie wrote Annie Boyle's name on her tablets--little ivory affairs which she always carried and made notes on.
”Do you know anyone else at the Mansion House?” she inquired.
”Not a soul.”
”How old is Annie?”
”Fourteen or fifteen.”
”She didn't conceive her unpatriotic ideas; she has heard someone else talk, and like a parrot repeats what she has heard.”
”Perhaps so; but--”
”All right. I'm not going to the Liberty Girls' Shop to-morrow, Mary Louise. At your invitation I'll make myself scarce, and nose around. To be quite frank, I consider this matter serious; more serious than you perhaps suspect. And, since you've put this case in my hands, I'm sure you and the dear colonel won't mind if I'm a bit eccentric in my movements while I'm doing detective work. I know the town pretty well, from my former visits, so I won't get lost. I may not accomplish anything, but you'd like me to try, wouldn't you?”
”Yes, indeed. That's why I've told you all this. I feel something ought to be done, and I can't do it myself.”
Josie slipped the tablets into her pocket.
”Mary Louise, the United States is honeycombed with German spies,” she gravely announced. ”They're keeping Daddy and all the Department of Justice pretty busy, so I've an inkling as to their activities. German spies are encouraged by German propagandists, who are not always German but may be Americans, or even British by birth, but are none the less deadly on that account. The paid spy has no nationality; he is true to no one but the devil, and he and his abettors fatten on treachery. His abettors are those who repeat sneering and slurring remarks about our conduct of the war. You may set it down that whoever is not pro-American is pro-German; whoever does not favor the Allies--all of them, mind you--favors the Kaiser; whoever is not loyal in this hour of our country's greatest need is a traitor.”
”You're right, Josie!”
<script>