“I wish to speak with you alone, Mr. Charles. Of course Mr. Theodore may remain if he so desires, but—” he looked meaningly at Josie, “others may retire. New girl, I presume.”
“Yes—let me introduce you to Miss O’Gorman, Major Simpson,” said the senior member of the firm.
“Smith,” hastily corrected the junior member. Major Simpson did not hear the correction and Josie was registered on the tablets of the old gentleman’s memory as O’Gorman and O’Gorman she was forced to remain, since it was deemed wiser not to take the present incumbent of house detective into their confidence and being introduced by one name and employed by another would certainly have caused suspicion.
“I am sorry Brother Charles made the break,” Theodore said as he accompanied Josie to the elevator, leaving his brother alone with Major Simpson.
“Oh, that’s all right,” laughed Josie. “I’m not much on aliases anyhow and really prefer working in my own name. Please let me have the list of employees and their addresses as soon as possible.”
CHAPTER II
THE NEW HOME ON MEADOW STREET
Wakely classed itself as a city, while Dorfield was content to be listed as a mere town that might someday grow up. In spite of its size, Wakely seemed to our young detective to be a very lonesome place on that first Sunday she was compelled to spend away from all her dear friends in Dorfield, where she had lived since her father’s death. There were plenty of people in Wakely, too many people, in fact, making the housing problem a serious one. But nobody knew Josie and nobody cared to know her. Nobody paid the least attention to her at the beautiful old church where she had gone to worship in the morning; nobody spoke to her at the clean little restaurant where she had eaten her Sunday dinner; and now as she sat on a bench in the city park, nobody in all the surging throngs out for the usual Sunday stroll even so much as glanced her way.
Josie was not inclined to be lonesome. She was too interested in people and things to think very much of her own aloneness, but there were times when in spite of herself she felt a crying need for a real home of her own; something more than the partitioned off rear end of a shop, which was where she had been living for some time before coming to Wakely. The place was called The Higgledy Piggledy Shop, conducted by Josie and her friends Elizabeth Wright and Irene Mae Farlane, and they had managed it to their profit and to the delectation of the citizens of Dorfield, who found in it a long felt want.
If the Higgledy Piggledies did not have what you wanted they would get it for you, and if they could not do what you wished done they would see to it that someone else did do it. For Josie the shop was in reality a side line of the detective business, but it was of great interest to her and she missed the gay chatter of the partners, the daily visits of her dear Mary Louise—young Mrs. Danny Dexter—and she sorely missed the kindly interest and advice of Captain Charlie Lonsdale, the Chief of Police of Dorfield. He it was who had so highly recommended Josie to Burnett & Burnett.