But Mr. Maynard had been reading the article while Anne had explained the methods of many newspapers, and now he exclaimed: “By jove! Dalken never said a word about all this life-history!”
“What’s that, Daddy? Read it to us,” begged Eleanor, eagerly.
“Why—wh-y-y—the young rascal hit it right on the head, all right! But where did he get it?” continued Mr. Maynard.
“For pity’s sake—read it aloud!” commanded Eleanor, hardly able to hold her tongue about the story.
Then Mr. Maynard read it, and it lost none of its vivid coloring by his reading, either. When he had almost concluded, Polly began to grow angry. When he finished, she was furious.
“I’m going up to that office and I’ll fight that reporter. He had no more right to print that than those other men had to use someone else’s photographs and call them ours. So there!”
Mr. Maynard had been thinking seriously, and now he nailed Eleanor with a penetrating look. “Nolla, did you tell that young rascal this story when you ran to the door with his pencil and paper last night?”
“No, indeed! I did not, Daddy! You can ask the butler if I ever did! He stood right there when I handed Dunlap the pencil!”
Eleanor’s denial was so emphatic that everyone believed she was innocent of any such plot; so they never found out who was the guilty one.
While at breakfast, the telephone rang. “This is Mr. Latimer, Anne. We have just read the papers and were so surprised! When we saw the pictures of the two heroines, we feared some dreadful thing had happened to distort their faces so that we failed to recognise them, and I hastened to inquire. Do you need Dr. Evans’ services to straighten out those faces?”