What an opportunity for the young detective! Mary Louise’s fingers actually trembled as she took hold of the picture.
But all her hopes were dashed to pieces at the first glance. The man was as different from Mary Louise’s burglar as anyone could possibly be. Six feet tall and broad-shouldered, he was smiling down tenderly at his new wife, who was at least a foot shorter.
“He’s charming, Mrs. Weinberger,” she tried to say steadily. “May I offer my congratulations?”
The older woman straightened up—and actually smiled!
“He is a civil engineer,” she read proudly. “But he couldn’t get a job, so he’s driving a taxi! Well, that’s an honest living, isn’t it?”
“I should say so!” exclaimed Max. “You’re lucky you don’t have to support him—as so many mothers and fathers-in-law have to nowadays.”
Mary Louise was pleased for Mrs. Weinberger’s sake but disappointed for her own. Miss Stoddard was all wrong: the solution was incorrect. And she was just as much at sea as ever!
“There’s your friend Pauline Brooks,” remarked Mrs. Weinberger. “And—look who’s with her!”
“That’s a friend of hers—a Miss Jackson,” explained Mary Louise, as the two girls, with their boy-friends, got up to dance.
“Miss Jackson nothing! That’s Mary Green—the chorus girl who was staying at Stoddard House when my watch was stolen. I’d like to have a talk with that young woman. But I suppose it wouldn’t do any good.”