“You’d better be nice to her, Mrs. Davis, if you know what’s good for you. Now, don’t flare up! You mustn’t forget you’ve broken the law by opening a telegram not intended for you.”
“What?”
“It isn’t addressed to you,” he said, examining the envelope. “Your name is still Mrs. Davis, isn’t it?”
“Of course it is.”
“Well, then, what in thunder did you open a telegram addressed to my wife for? That’s my wife’s name, not yours.”
“But,” she began, vastly perplexed, “but it was meant for me.”
“How do you know?” he demanded.
Her eyes bulged. “You—you don’t mean that there is another one, Harvey?”
He winked with grave deliberateness. “That’s for you to find out.”
He darted through the back door into the alley, just as she collapsed in the prescriptionist’s arms. In the telegraph office he read and re-read the message, his eyes aglow. It was from Nellie and came from New York, dated Friday, the first. 235